I never thought that any movie could compare to Shaun of the Dead. I mean, that movie made zombies funny. It made apocalyptic scenarios just a little more silly.
Then I watched Zombieland.
This movie does for Zombies what Godfather did for mafia movies. Except without the dead horse. Let me explain.
Horror/Comedy is pretty much one of the hardest things to do these days. If you think about it, it's like doing a Romance/Murder movie. It's heaven and hell, cold and hot. I think you get the idea.
Lava and ice.
Okay, stop it. Anyway, mixing these two can be really difficult. You have to give the audience a sense of personal danger to the characters, while at the same time keeping the overall mood of the movie out of the depression gutter where the only reason people don't cut their wrists right there in the theatre is because there's laws about shaving in public. There's a clear difference in dark humor and slapstick or situational comedy, and choosing the right one can make or break your movie. While not the same genre, Fight Club chose to stick to it's dark comedy, when it easily could have been something out of Benny Hill's ass.
In Zombieland we are treated to a world devoid of just about every human on earth. A virus (apparently initiated by a bad burger) has wiped out all of humanity, and Columbus (Jesse Eisenberg) is one of the few left. He has a shopping list of phobias which he delivers to the other survivors throughout the movie, and is the quintessential loner/shut-in. While his character is perfectly set up, his lines and actions don't always match up to what is expected of the typical nerd.
Eventually, Columbus meets up with Tallahassee, a redneck cowboy with nothing but ass-kicking and awesome in his veins. There's a reason Woody Harrelson was put on this earth, and this character is pretty much why. He's just the kind of person you can see surviving this sort of thing, with the perfect amount of reckless abandonment and level-headedness that makes race car drivers and assassins good at what they do. The two of them venture towards California, looking for an apparently zombie-free theme park. In this conversation, however, Tallahassee reveals his doubts about the park, stating that (essentially) it's always the opposite direction from where you came from.
From here we meet the duo of Emma Stone and Abagail Breslin (Wichita and Little Rock, respectively) who turn out to be the perfect con-women in a post apocalyptic world. They are seemingly devoid of any emotion towards our two heroes, but along the way everyone's walls are broken down in some form or another.
To keep going from this point in the movie is to reveal way too much of the plot, so I'm obliged to answer some of the typical Zombie movie criteria for a good movie.
1. Does it do the Zombie genre justice?
Yes. There's plenty of zombies in it, and the movie doesn't lose itself in trying to explain just how or why humanity failed.
2. Are all zombies killed in a logical manner?
Yes. These zombies are not Romero truffle-shuffle zombies, but instead are the kind you'd have to do a decent sprint to keep away from, usually. They are deterred by body hits but will not go down pretty much without a decapitation or suitable head trauma.
3. Is it gory without being gore-for-gore's sake?
Yes, you won't find gore-porn here, instead it's all done in a way that is cool and comfortably timed depending on the situation.
All in all, Zombieland should definately be on your list when it comes out on DVD/Blu-ray, and right under Shaun of the Dead on your Zombie movie list.
If you've already seen the movie or DO NOT MIND SPOILERS click on for a discussion about the more intricate parts of the movie.
Monday, October 5, 2009
Saturday, August 29, 2009
The Colony
If ever there was a show to prep you for some kind of shit-hits-the-fan disaster, The Colony on Discovery might be just the show.
The background is this: A massive virus has wiped out most of humanity, leaving animals and only a few scant survivors left to forage some sort of existence out of the aftermath. After being left awake for 36 hours, the first 6 survivors get 15 minutes to scramble for supplies at an abandoned grocery store, and are then left to walk for miles until they come to a place simple labeled 'Sanctuary'. It is a sprawling old factory that from all appearances looks like it was once inhabited by other survivors, but was then abandoned.
The show's cast takes normal people with the best logical skill set for survival: A nurse, machinist, marine scientist, martial arts instructor, doctor, solar energy tech, independent contractor, aerospace engineer, computer engineer, and a mechanical engineer.
Discovery presents the show as a sort of 'pitri dish' experiment, with cameras following the survivors around, and at certain points providing opportunities and challenges for the 'survivors.' The biggest threat that the colonists find is a renegade, leather-clad gang that torments them on a fairly regular basis.
It's hard to gauge the numerous factors the show throws at you: the gangs to a decent job of upsetting the colonists, yet they feel danger in a situation where logic would dictate that they would never really be in harm's way except in what they create themselves. There is no obvious or clear reward for anyone on the show to be better or more 'successful' than another person, and they all seem to do a decent job of reminding each other of the 'reality' of their situation.
There are 3 experts that interject at various times in the show to discuss the psychological, situational, or mechanical details of what is occurring. The psychologist reminds us that if you are put into a bleak enough situation you truly can begin to believe what is occurring and you take the reality around you at face value. This can breed distrust or anger at something that is otherwise relatively mundane or useless for us normally, like bartering and trading.
The situational expert will jump in and give small tidbits about other disasters and how they relate to the colonists, mostly hurricane Katrina, as it is pretty much the only thing we all remember, apparently. The mechanical expert is nice to have, and gives us insight into how the inventions the colonists make work and their often deadly consequences should they screw up.
I honestly don't know if I can believe everything inside the show's reality. They do a good job rationalizing the things they do to the colonists, but with a limited time frame to do everything they seem to create a stress level that might not be there if there was more time to do certain jobs or scenarios. For example, once the colonists 'secure' the Sanctuary, the gangs seem to drop off the radar. Now, they might certainly come back later, but we'll see, I guess.
The Colony gets a definite 'WATCH' from me, if only for the thought-provoking imagery it contains.
The background is this: A massive virus has wiped out most of humanity, leaving animals and only a few scant survivors left to forage some sort of existence out of the aftermath. After being left awake for 36 hours, the first 6 survivors get 15 minutes to scramble for supplies at an abandoned grocery store, and are then left to walk for miles until they come to a place simple labeled 'Sanctuary'. It is a sprawling old factory that from all appearances looks like it was once inhabited by other survivors, but was then abandoned.
The show's cast takes normal people with the best logical skill set for survival: A nurse, machinist, marine scientist, martial arts instructor, doctor, solar energy tech, independent contractor, aerospace engineer, computer engineer, and a mechanical engineer.
Discovery presents the show as a sort of 'pitri dish' experiment, with cameras following the survivors around, and at certain points providing opportunities and challenges for the 'survivors.' The biggest threat that the colonists find is a renegade, leather-clad gang that torments them on a fairly regular basis.
It's hard to gauge the numerous factors the show throws at you: the gangs to a decent job of upsetting the colonists, yet they feel danger in a situation where logic would dictate that they would never really be in harm's way except in what they create themselves. There is no obvious or clear reward for anyone on the show to be better or more 'successful' than another person, and they all seem to do a decent job of reminding each other of the 'reality' of their situation.
There are 3 experts that interject at various times in the show to discuss the psychological, situational, or mechanical details of what is occurring. The psychologist reminds us that if you are put into a bleak enough situation you truly can begin to believe what is occurring and you take the reality around you at face value. This can breed distrust or anger at something that is otherwise relatively mundane or useless for us normally, like bartering and trading.
The situational expert will jump in and give small tidbits about other disasters and how they relate to the colonists, mostly hurricane Katrina, as it is pretty much the only thing we all remember, apparently. The mechanical expert is nice to have, and gives us insight into how the inventions the colonists make work and their often deadly consequences should they screw up.
I honestly don't know if I can believe everything inside the show's reality. They do a good job rationalizing the things they do to the colonists, but with a limited time frame to do everything they seem to create a stress level that might not be there if there was more time to do certain jobs or scenarios. For example, once the colonists 'secure' the Sanctuary, the gangs seem to drop off the radar. Now, they might certainly come back later, but we'll see, I guess.
The Colony gets a definite 'WATCH' from me, if only for the thought-provoking imagery it contains.
Sunday, June 21, 2009
Things you need to see
So I've been reading The Fart Party and I'm loving every panel of it. Julia does for comics what many fail to do: connect us with a reality that's right in front of us. Instead of putting herself in a world where everything is perfectly funny, she brings us down to earth with hobos, being dateless for over three years, and alcohol.
I'm not against comics that send you to other planets or other plains of reality- it's just nice to see one that doesn't jump off the reality train for the sake of being funny (very often) because real life is hilarious enough as it is.
The Fart Party
I'm not against comics that send you to other planets or other plains of reality- it's just nice to see one that doesn't jump off the reality train for the sake of being funny (very often) because real life is hilarious enough as it is.
The Fart Party
Thursday, June 4, 2009
A few quick trailer impressions...
I love Apple pretty much only for their one stop shop for trailers. I know it's not 'the only' place for trailers, but the site lacks annoying ads and a comments section, so while it might lose points for not having a up-to-the-minute it gains those points back for being completely void of general idiocy.
There's quite a few movies coming out (we all know it ramps up tenfold in the summer) so I figured I'd make a few first impressions off of the trailers. It's not the best practice in the world, and while certain genre's use certain tactics to convey the overall tone of the movie, it's more important as to what the movie is. I lack real images for any of the movies because copyrights are bad, k?
1. Surrogates
From the trailer page, this movie only stars Bruce Willis, which is weird because there's a lot of women and black people in the movie, and while Bruce Willis has range, I don't think skin tone or a vagina is something they teach you in acting class.
Bruce stars as a cop (slow down, my heart. The shock will wear off soon.) in the future where everyone has a 'surrogate', a robot that more or less looks like the one controlling it, except it won't allow the user to feel pain. Basically, it's like the ultimate World of Warcraft without flying mounts. Unless you count jets.
Low and behold, someone finds out how to actually kill someone by killing their surrogate. Willis ends up at the center of all this, at one point losing his (robot) arm and getting slammed by a truck. That part looks pretty sweet. There's helicopters too.
The whole thing is apparently based on a graphic novel, which I'm sure is flattering to the author to have Bruce Willis play your main character, but it looks like every other futuristic action movie subplot: robots are bad because they are flawed. I'm sure the movie will turn a profit, at least off of Bruce's name alone.
Verdict: If you like action movies and you don't require anything more than flames and bullets, save up a few bucks and go see it.
Surrogates trailer
2. Sherlock Holmes
Robert Downey Jr. & Jude Law star as Sherlock Holmes and Watson (respectively) and go around making a huge, apparently-hilarious mess of things while using clever tricks and logic to solve mysteries.
I've never read up on or seen any Sherlock Holmes movie (and if I did, it was on accident,) but I always thought it was a more serious sort of plot, I mean, this is murder after all.
Whether or not you think it's a complete bastardization of the source material, it looks at least mildly entertaining. Robert Downey Jr. certainly has gained a knack for comedy, and Jude Law was pretty badass in Enemy At The Gates, so there's that. It's hard to glean any real plot off of the movie- apparently a guy is back from the dead, and he's apparently dangerous. Either he'll kill a bunch of people or they will find him in a room full of puppies.
Reccomendation: If you liked Ironman because you thought Robert Downey Jr. was genuinly a good actor, go see this. If you like Jude Law, go get a therapist if it's anything other than cinematic attraction.
Sherlock Holmes trailer
3. The Hurt Locker
I find movies about current events being one of two things: Horribly didactic or being almost offensive to anyone who can truely understand what people go through on a daily basis. The Hurt Locker stars Jeremy Renner as a Staff Sargeant in Iraq who is an ace at disabling bombs, and it seems he specializes in the often-booby trapped ones that are found in Iraq.
We start with Renner's character (William James) apparently disabling a car's trunk that is filled with bombs. This seems to be his first run with the unit, and to make an impression he removes all of his safety gear, with the idea that if he's going to die, he might as well be comfortable.
What the movie lacks in character development it will hopefully make up for with it's over-used message of 'these people have a lot to lose.' It's not that I don't respect that message or anything, I do very much, but we get it. I understand it's realistic and the movie is certainly going for that, but I need something other than just explosions to keep me hooked. Who is planting these bombs- is it just one person? I like cat-and-mouse games with puzzles like bombs or other lethal weapons. What I don't like is a 2-hour-long movie that slams into my head the reality of war. World War 2 movies did that, thanks.
Reccomendation: It's definately for people who are into war, and edge-of-your-seat movies- it is not for people who are looking for blood-pumping action. This movie will probably have a lot of little details built into it's story, and might turn off those looking for something more shallow.
4. Shrink
Ah, psychology movies. They get me all warm and fuzzy inside. Except this one, because whoever wrote this hasn't left California. Ever. EVER. k?
I love A Beautiful Mind because despite it's technical flaws (like the entire story of John Nash being changed to make him more appealing as a character) it comes off as a pretty haunting story about Psychological disorders.
Shrink seems to want to explain to people not only that 'stars are people too' but 'being a psycologist is hard' both of which are kind of obvious. I get the impression that Kevn Spacey's character is depressed not only because he's had so many clients that he can't care about them anymore (plot point 1) but because being in the spotlight gets really old (plot point 2) espcially if you aren't a movie star. What I fail to see is a turn of events that is not corny enough to get me to watch it. We all know how it's going to end: Spacey is going to somehow revitalize himself and realize that without his help, everyone would put a gun to their head.
I guess I'm not a big fan of such blatently happy-ending movies because it's not very genuine when the main character solves everything by the end of the movie, and usually finds love along the way.
Patch Adams is a brilliant movie because it teaches us that shit ain't gonna turn out great all the time. It's the only one I can think of right now that looked to have everything going for it plot-wise, then turned everything on it's head and sent you into such a rollercoaster of emotions that we all cried for 20 minutes when the shit hit the fan.
If this movie does this, I'll probably pee my pants, but at the same time, I guess I won't because:
Reccomendation: Wait until it's at the bargin-bin for $5 or get it off of Netflix, which will probably happen before Halloween.
Shrink trailer
Well kids, that's all for now. If you want me to look at anything that looks more interesting, let me know.
There's quite a few movies coming out (we all know it ramps up tenfold in the summer) so I figured I'd make a few first impressions off of the trailers. It's not the best practice in the world, and while certain genre's use certain tactics to convey the overall tone of the movie, it's more important as to what the movie is. I lack real images for any of the movies because copyrights are bad, k?
1. Surrogates
From the trailer page, this movie only stars Bruce Willis, which is weird because there's a lot of women and black people in the movie, and while Bruce Willis has range, I don't think skin tone or a vagina is something they teach you in acting class.
Bruce stars as a cop (slow down, my heart. The shock will wear off soon.) in the future where everyone has a 'surrogate', a robot that more or less looks like the one controlling it, except it won't allow the user to feel pain. Basically, it's like the ultimate World of Warcraft without flying mounts. Unless you count jets.
Low and behold, someone finds out how to actually kill someone by killing their surrogate. Willis ends up at the center of all this, at one point losing his (robot) arm and getting slammed by a truck. That part looks pretty sweet. There's helicopters too.
The whole thing is apparently based on a graphic novel, which I'm sure is flattering to the author to have Bruce Willis play your main character, but it looks like every other futuristic action movie subplot: robots are bad because they are flawed. I'm sure the movie will turn a profit, at least off of Bruce's name alone.
Verdict: If you like action movies and you don't require anything more than flames and bullets, save up a few bucks and go see it.
Surrogates trailer
2. Sherlock Holmes
Robert Downey Jr. & Jude Law star as Sherlock Holmes and Watson (respectively) and go around making a huge, apparently-hilarious mess of things while using clever tricks and logic to solve mysteries.
I've never read up on or seen any Sherlock Holmes movie (and if I did, it was on accident,) but I always thought it was a more serious sort of plot, I mean, this is murder after all.
Whether or not you think it's a complete bastardization of the source material, it looks at least mildly entertaining. Robert Downey Jr. certainly has gained a knack for comedy, and Jude Law was pretty badass in Enemy At The Gates, so there's that. It's hard to glean any real plot off of the movie- apparently a guy is back from the dead, and he's apparently dangerous. Either he'll kill a bunch of people or they will find him in a room full of puppies.
Reccomendation: If you liked Ironman because you thought Robert Downey Jr. was genuinly a good actor, go see this. If you like Jude Law, go get a therapist if it's anything other than cinematic attraction.
Sherlock Holmes trailer
3. The Hurt Locker
I find movies about current events being one of two things: Horribly didactic or being almost offensive to anyone who can truely understand what people go through on a daily basis. The Hurt Locker stars Jeremy Renner as a Staff Sargeant in Iraq who is an ace at disabling bombs, and it seems he specializes in the often-booby trapped ones that are found in Iraq.
We start with Renner's character (William James) apparently disabling a car's trunk that is filled with bombs. This seems to be his first run with the unit, and to make an impression he removes all of his safety gear, with the idea that if he's going to die, he might as well be comfortable.
What the movie lacks in character development it will hopefully make up for with it's over-used message of 'these people have a lot to lose.' It's not that I don't respect that message or anything, I do very much, but we get it. I understand it's realistic and the movie is certainly going for that, but I need something other than just explosions to keep me hooked. Who is planting these bombs- is it just one person? I like cat-and-mouse games with puzzles like bombs or other lethal weapons. What I don't like is a 2-hour-long movie that slams into my head the reality of war. World War 2 movies did that, thanks.
Reccomendation: It's definately for people who are into war, and edge-of-your-seat movies- it is not for people who are looking for blood-pumping action. This movie will probably have a lot of little details built into it's story, and might turn off those looking for something more shallow.
4. Shrink
Ah, psychology movies. They get me all warm and fuzzy inside. Except this one, because whoever wrote this hasn't left California. Ever. EVER. k?
I love A Beautiful Mind because despite it's technical flaws (like the entire story of John Nash being changed to make him more appealing as a character) it comes off as a pretty haunting story about Psychological disorders.
Shrink seems to want to explain to people not only that 'stars are people too' but 'being a psycologist is hard' both of which are kind of obvious. I get the impression that Kevn Spacey's character is depressed not only because he's had so many clients that he can't care about them anymore (plot point 1) but because being in the spotlight gets really old (plot point 2) espcially if you aren't a movie star. What I fail to see is a turn of events that is not corny enough to get me to watch it. We all know how it's going to end: Spacey is going to somehow revitalize himself and realize that without his help, everyone would put a gun to their head.
I guess I'm not a big fan of such blatently happy-ending movies because it's not very genuine when the main character solves everything by the end of the movie, and usually finds love along the way.
Patch Adams is a brilliant movie because it teaches us that shit ain't gonna turn out great all the time. It's the only one I can think of right now that looked to have everything going for it plot-wise, then turned everything on it's head and sent you into such a rollercoaster of emotions that we all cried for 20 minutes when the shit hit the fan.
If this movie does this, I'll probably pee my pants, but at the same time, I guess I won't because:
Reccomendation: Wait until it's at the bargin-bin for $5 or get it off of Netflix, which will probably happen before Halloween.
Shrink trailer
Well kids, that's all for now. If you want me to look at anything that looks more interesting, let me know.
Thursday, May 28, 2009
Holy crap, you're probably an idiot.
So I'm kind of in a mood to rant since... I dunno. It's not important. I'll cover a few topics, so try to keep up a bit.
The Green Movement
I have nothing against the Earth. Really. We've known each other for a long time, and so far we've gotten along. I don't hurt the Earth, it doesn't hurt me. At least, if I am hurting it or it's hurting me, neither of us care enough to tell the other.
There's other people that say (and I'm generalizing, because I'm too lazy to find quotes and cite my sources; take that, high school English.) that the Earth is pretty much going to kill us all because we all drive cars and eat red meat, and a few other things that have to do with ducks and trees, but most of that is kind of vague.
Anyway, most of the green movement can take their crap and shove it up their arse, because most of the crap about pollution and global warming is kind of shit- in a very literal sense. We aren't going to die in 2012 because you still have the Escalade you sold one of your kidney's (and probably a child somewhere) to get. While I do agree with the idea that we should be creating cars that don't look like everything that symbolizes what an ass you are, I don't think we need to start stealing normal cars out of garages and replacing them with scooters and a few AA batteries from Wal-Mart. People like to damn-near spit on people who bought (and for some reason still buy) those big SUV's and take their crappy Geo's and drive off, but really when you think about it, those people are paying out the ass for gas every time at the pump, if they fill it all the way, that is. A lot of them don't. Sometimes I rubberneck at the gas station, and a lot of those SUV's are only putting in about 10 gallons a pop. Yeah, it all equals out in the end I suppose, but it's the idea that even they realize that buying that huge peice of crap wasn't the best idea.
We aren't going to hell in a handbasket because of cars and pollution and all that- a lot of what Al Gore is talking about has happened all the time- even before we were around. Go ahead and google "Earth temperature graph" and find one that goes back really far- like before the ice age. See where our temperature is? It's not even near as hot as the Earth has been before. But also, look at the timeline: it's probably in thousands of years. Yeah. You'll be feeling that in your grave.
You can't have a valid arguement about global warming when it already has happened before, and more or less is something that happens once in a while. It's natural. Deal with it.
A lot of the arguements the green movement makes are valid to a certain extent: we should keep up on recycling stuff, work on alternative fuels, start making power plants more effecient, bring solar energy to something everyone can afford, and stop being dipshits about what happens to our trash.
But don't go around screaming that we're all going to die if you don't recycle that soda can. There's always going to be people that won't believe you. Always. Just save your breath and walk calmly behind them, pick up the can, and fling it at their head and turn 90° to whatever direction has an easy escape route.
The majority of anyone a at least a few years younger than me, and some my age.
I thought that the generational gap was sort of large- the people who I grew up with were often older than me, at least besides my friends in school. None of them ever seemed stupid or obnoxious, and certainly none of them were "mainstream" because back in the day there wasn't really a lot of "mainstream" things that grabbed kids attention. It was the 90's, we didn't care. If we did, I wasn't aware of it.
These days, there's so many things a kid can get into, and so easily, that it's really starting to get annoying. I know how corporate America is, that's not it. I know that they will use any means to get their product or service to kids, and it's been that way for a while. I'm more annoyed with how they do it.
You know what I'm talking about: those commercials for cell phone backgrounds (that are still around, so that means that there is still stupidity in this world) that are filled with some hiphop beat (often not even an actual song, just bass hits) and a guy who I'm pretty sure has already suffered 18 heart attacks from talking so enthusiastically without being on speed. You text a number to another number, and with the magik of the 'internets' you get some craptastic background. By law, they have to have that frog guy in them. For serious.
I'm not trying to be nostalgic so much as I don't understand why this sort of thing works. It still obviously does because I still see the commercials everywhere. I thought kids would be smart enough to look at that and go "wow, that background looks like shit on a hot summer day" and something along the lines of "I have a basic understanding of MSPaint and I know how to copy/paste whatever naked woman I want and send it to my phone from my email" but instead they text that number for whatever stupid background is jiggling around the screen faster than Neo at the end of the first Matrix movie.
The same sort of misunderstanding I have with the younger generation also applies to a lot of things: Pop music (it's not what it used to mean), the internet (no, it's not a place to sing over some song you think is cool with your shitty webcam and a microphone I swear you stole off of a 1980's cellphone), and fashion (just simply, what the fuck.)
I get the feeling more kids are being pampered to shit and back by their parents, and I don't understand why. I know it's hard to say no to a kid, but my parents used to use something along the lines of "no, you can't have that." and it was the 2nd most common phrase in my childhood other than "holy shit what did you do?!" and just ahead of "did you do your homework?" All of this comes at the expense of other people's sanity. We all see this sort of thing, just go to a large mall on a Saturday, if you dare. You'll see tons of kids who think it is the coolest thing to just walk around the mall being a dumbass. I don't know about you, but when did that become a genuine pastime to kids? I used to play outside when I was really young, and when I started middle school the outside was fun but I liked doing things like reading and hanging out with my friends at their goddam houses instead of some often-too-cold mall with a shit storm of people who are trying to get somewhere and get out of that hellhole before noon.
I'm really not looking foreward to getting older, and not the usual reasons like balding or losing my eyesight, but really I'm worried that I'm going to have to deal with a 30-something guy in a convenience store who knows jack shit about where the nearest service station is because I have a hole in my tire, and he can't tell me because he's never fixed a damn flat in his life. The next entry I make will probably be my own list of what you need to do before you turn 25 that will help you survive at least another 20 years before you kill yourself.
Anyway: I've got two kids (at least for now) and so help me, they aren't going to fall into whatever shit hole of a trance teenagers and a lot of people my age have fallen into and be little pricks when they get older. We don't need this sort of shit; we need people who are actually going to take a step back and think about what they are doing.
The iPhone
Yeah, yeah, it's been out for about 20 years now and everyone has written about all the bad things about it (of course it doesn't have copy and paste; Apple doesn't expect you to remember shit) and why it is overpriced (did you see the logo? It's the Apple logo. Duh.) but a lot of people don't get what I'm saying when I say it's not that big of a deal. For at least this many reasons:
1. You don't need the internet on your phone. Get over it.
No, no, no. You don't need the internet on your phone. Why? Becuase it wasn't made for phones; it was made for power-sucking computers and NASA. Besides a bunch of nerdy shit (like a phone's resolution compared to even a dinky 13 inch CRT is like comparing your dick to an ants) there's a line that has been crossed between having the utter annoyance of having a cell phone (people always expect you to answer it) and the annoyance of the internet (read: the whole danm thing) in one device: now people are annoyed that you aren't updating your stupid twitter account every time you cross the street.
2. Everything about Apple is pretty much retarded and old by the time you see it.
Remember that little Apple laptop that could fit in an envelope? It was maybe as thin as your grandmother's hair? It was pretty stupid. Why? Becuase laptops aren't supposed to be able to be broken by an infant breathing on it. Toughbooks were made for falling out of the Empire State Building (it happens less often then you think, morons) and the Airbook or whatever was made to be flung to Scotland from Dubai by simply getting the angle right. The iPhone is no different: it's a PDA (google that too, because you probably don't know what one really is) that has a phone attached to it. Blackberry has been doing that pretty much since the 30's and they are actually getting tired of doing it- it's called a laptop. Get one. You can get a used one for less than an iPhone and you still don't need the internet wherever you are.
3. You most likely look like a douche when you use one.
This is less about Apple being 'mainstream' and more about it's touchscreen: it's not that revolutionary. PDA's have had this since forever. There's a reason they all have stylus: your fingers are goddam retarded for something so small. Think about it: touchscreens barely even work at the damn bank, let alone on a screen a fraction of the size with buttons smaller than your pinky. The iPhone was simply programmed to take your sausage of a finger and more or less guess (literally) what you wanted to touch, and they got pretty good at making it guess right.
4. There's a lot of apps at the App Store because you're an idiot.
You don't need to use your iPhone as a level. If you are putting up a picture frame you really shouldn't have your phone anywhere near a hammer, nails, or whatever you think you need to hang up that $15 picture frame from target. Put it in another room and just turn the ring up a little. Unless it's a damn good game, don't buy any of them- most of them are pointless and unless you get something like Scrabble (which is proven to at least keep you as smart as you are, if not make you smarter) you are wasting whatever little money you have left from buying that stupid thing. Because you have the internet on that shit pile, you don't need any app that gives you any sort of information that you know is on the internet somewhere already. For example, if you live in a place that has more restaraunts than cars, you really don't need your phone to tell you where to go for Chinese food- look for the damn neon Kanji characters on the building and make sure there aren't men in suits with guns or prostitutes hanging around, and you'll be fine (actually, this goes for pretty much anywhere, not just restaraunts.) If you're too lazy to look up directions to somewhere before you go in the first place anyway, you deserve to be lost, because you are a moron.
So, don't buy an iPhone, or pretty much any phone that does anything other than call or text people and you'll be fine. Future generations will thank you for not being a goddam doucebag.
That's all the time I have for right now- there's a lot more that I was going to rant about but it's getting late and I'm pretty sure if I kept going I'd be hauled out in a body bag the cororner would look at me and just shake his head, saying something along the lines of "tapdancing jesus, another one."
The Green Movement
I have nothing against the Earth. Really. We've known each other for a long time, and so far we've gotten along. I don't hurt the Earth, it doesn't hurt me. At least, if I am hurting it or it's hurting me, neither of us care enough to tell the other.
There's other people that say (and I'm generalizing, because I'm too lazy to find quotes and cite my sources; take that, high school English.) that the Earth is pretty much going to kill us all because we all drive cars and eat red meat, and a few other things that have to do with ducks and trees, but most of that is kind of vague.
Anyway, most of the green movement can take their crap and shove it up their arse, because most of the crap about pollution and global warming is kind of shit- in a very literal sense. We aren't going to die in 2012 because you still have the Escalade you sold one of your kidney's (and probably a child somewhere) to get. While I do agree with the idea that we should be creating cars that don't look like everything that symbolizes what an ass you are, I don't think we need to start stealing normal cars out of garages and replacing them with scooters and a few AA batteries from Wal-Mart. People like to damn-near spit on people who bought (and for some reason still buy) those big SUV's and take their crappy Geo's and drive off, but really when you think about it, those people are paying out the ass for gas every time at the pump, if they fill it all the way, that is. A lot of them don't. Sometimes I rubberneck at the gas station, and a lot of those SUV's are only putting in about 10 gallons a pop. Yeah, it all equals out in the end I suppose, but it's the idea that even they realize that buying that huge peice of crap wasn't the best idea.
We aren't going to hell in a handbasket because of cars and pollution and all that- a lot of what Al Gore is talking about has happened all the time- even before we were around. Go ahead and google "Earth temperature graph" and find one that goes back really far- like before the ice age. See where our temperature is? It's not even near as hot as the Earth has been before. But also, look at the timeline: it's probably in thousands of years. Yeah. You'll be feeling that in your grave.
You can't have a valid arguement about global warming when it already has happened before, and more or less is something that happens once in a while. It's natural. Deal with it.
A lot of the arguements the green movement makes are valid to a certain extent: we should keep up on recycling stuff, work on alternative fuels, start making power plants more effecient, bring solar energy to something everyone can afford, and stop being dipshits about what happens to our trash.
But don't go around screaming that we're all going to die if you don't recycle that soda can. There's always going to be people that won't believe you. Always. Just save your breath and walk calmly behind them, pick up the can, and fling it at their head and turn 90° to whatever direction has an easy escape route.
The majority of anyone a at least a few years younger than me, and some my age.
I thought that the generational gap was sort of large- the people who I grew up with were often older than me, at least besides my friends in school. None of them ever seemed stupid or obnoxious, and certainly none of them were "mainstream" because back in the day there wasn't really a lot of "mainstream" things that grabbed kids attention. It was the 90's, we didn't care. If we did, I wasn't aware of it.
These days, there's so many things a kid can get into, and so easily, that it's really starting to get annoying. I know how corporate America is, that's not it. I know that they will use any means to get their product or service to kids, and it's been that way for a while. I'm more annoyed with how they do it.
You know what I'm talking about: those commercials for cell phone backgrounds (that are still around, so that means that there is still stupidity in this world) that are filled with some hiphop beat (often not even an actual song, just bass hits) and a guy who I'm pretty sure has already suffered 18 heart attacks from talking so enthusiastically without being on speed. You text a number to another number, and with the magik of the 'internets' you get some craptastic background. By law, they have to have that frog guy in them. For serious.
I'm not trying to be nostalgic so much as I don't understand why this sort of thing works. It still obviously does because I still see the commercials everywhere. I thought kids would be smart enough to look at that and go "wow, that background looks like shit on a hot summer day" and something along the lines of "I have a basic understanding of MSPaint and I know how to copy/paste whatever naked woman I want and send it to my phone from my email" but instead they text that number for whatever stupid background is jiggling around the screen faster than Neo at the end of the first Matrix movie.
The same sort of misunderstanding I have with the younger generation also applies to a lot of things: Pop music (it's not what it used to mean), the internet (no, it's not a place to sing over some song you think is cool with your shitty webcam and a microphone I swear you stole off of a 1980's cellphone), and fashion (just simply, what the fuck.)
I get the feeling more kids are being pampered to shit and back by their parents, and I don't understand why. I know it's hard to say no to a kid, but my parents used to use something along the lines of "no, you can't have that." and it was the 2nd most common phrase in my childhood other than "holy shit what did you do?!" and just ahead of "did you do your homework?" All of this comes at the expense of other people's sanity. We all see this sort of thing, just go to a large mall on a Saturday, if you dare. You'll see tons of kids who think it is the coolest thing to just walk around the mall being a dumbass. I don't know about you, but when did that become a genuine pastime to kids? I used to play outside when I was really young, and when I started middle school the outside was fun but I liked doing things like reading and hanging out with my friends at their goddam houses instead of some often-too-cold mall with a shit storm of people who are trying to get somewhere and get out of that hellhole before noon.
I'm really not looking foreward to getting older, and not the usual reasons like balding or losing my eyesight, but really I'm worried that I'm going to have to deal with a 30-something guy in a convenience store who knows jack shit about where the nearest service station is because I have a hole in my tire, and he can't tell me because he's never fixed a damn flat in his life. The next entry I make will probably be my own list of what you need to do before you turn 25 that will help you survive at least another 20 years before you kill yourself.
Anyway: I've got two kids (at least for now) and so help me, they aren't going to fall into whatever shit hole of a trance teenagers and a lot of people my age have fallen into and be little pricks when they get older. We don't need this sort of shit; we need people who are actually going to take a step back and think about what they are doing.
The iPhone
Yeah, yeah, it's been out for about 20 years now and everyone has written about all the bad things about it (of course it doesn't have copy and paste; Apple doesn't expect you to remember shit) and why it is overpriced (did you see the logo? It's the Apple logo. Duh.) but a lot of people don't get what I'm saying when I say it's not that big of a deal. For at least this many reasons:
1. You don't need the internet on your phone. Get over it.
No, no, no. You don't need the internet on your phone. Why? Becuase it wasn't made for phones; it was made for power-sucking computers and NASA. Besides a bunch of nerdy shit (like a phone's resolution compared to even a dinky 13 inch CRT is like comparing your dick to an ants) there's a line that has been crossed between having the utter annoyance of having a cell phone (people always expect you to answer it) and the annoyance of the internet (read: the whole danm thing) in one device: now people are annoyed that you aren't updating your stupid twitter account every time you cross the street.
2. Everything about Apple is pretty much retarded and old by the time you see it.
Remember that little Apple laptop that could fit in an envelope? It was maybe as thin as your grandmother's hair? It was pretty stupid. Why? Becuase laptops aren't supposed to be able to be broken by an infant breathing on it. Toughbooks were made for falling out of the Empire State Building (it happens less often then you think, morons) and the Airbook or whatever was made to be flung to Scotland from Dubai by simply getting the angle right. The iPhone is no different: it's a PDA (google that too, because you probably don't know what one really is) that has a phone attached to it. Blackberry has been doing that pretty much since the 30's and they are actually getting tired of doing it- it's called a laptop. Get one. You can get a used one for less than an iPhone and you still don't need the internet wherever you are.
3. You most likely look like a douche when you use one.
This is less about Apple being 'mainstream' and more about it's touchscreen: it's not that revolutionary. PDA's have had this since forever. There's a reason they all have stylus: your fingers are goddam retarded for something so small. Think about it: touchscreens barely even work at the damn bank, let alone on a screen a fraction of the size with buttons smaller than your pinky. The iPhone was simply programmed to take your sausage of a finger and more or less guess (literally) what you wanted to touch, and they got pretty good at making it guess right.
4. There's a lot of apps at the App Store because you're an idiot.
You don't need to use your iPhone as a level. If you are putting up a picture frame you really shouldn't have your phone anywhere near a hammer, nails, or whatever you think you need to hang up that $15 picture frame from target. Put it in another room and just turn the ring up a little. Unless it's a damn good game, don't buy any of them- most of them are pointless and unless you get something like Scrabble (which is proven to at least keep you as smart as you are, if not make you smarter) you are wasting whatever little money you have left from buying that stupid thing. Because you have the internet on that shit pile, you don't need any app that gives you any sort of information that you know is on the internet somewhere already. For example, if you live in a place that has more restaraunts than cars, you really don't need your phone to tell you where to go for Chinese food- look for the damn neon Kanji characters on the building and make sure there aren't men in suits with guns or prostitutes hanging around, and you'll be fine (actually, this goes for pretty much anywhere, not just restaraunts.) If you're too lazy to look up directions to somewhere before you go in the first place anyway, you deserve to be lost, because you are a moron.
So, don't buy an iPhone, or pretty much any phone that does anything other than call or text people and you'll be fine. Future generations will thank you for not being a goddam doucebag.
That's all the time I have for right now- there's a lot more that I was going to rant about but it's getting late and I'm pretty sure if I kept going I'd be hauled out in a body bag the cororner would look at me and just shake his head, saying something along the lines of "tapdancing jesus, another one."
Sunday, June 29, 2008
Flaming Reviews: ZZT
ZZT was created way back before Lego Builder came out by Epic Games. Epic created a few other games that aren't really worth mentioning in this review.
To say ZZT is a game really isn't right because it's more of a game creator. It operates on a .zzt world-based file system, and comes with three games that showcase what the game can do and some decent ways to create stories and worlds without telling you outright to copy them. However in front of all of this is the fact that the default super-pastel colors of the game can make you go blind or become impotent. Thankfully, the internet was created and people starting wondering just where the other colors that are in old DOS games were and they were able to create them in the game, opening the pallete to some more eye-pleasing darker tones.
Creating a world in the game is easy, just open the editor and start placing lines down. You'll soon find the need, however, to create an object that does something exciting, or at least what you think is exciting. The Object Orientated Programming (or OOP, not to be confused with POOP) isn't very complex which makes the learning curve relatively low and it won't be long before you're going about creating these fantastic ancient 2-D adventures. Or maybe not.
The simple fact is that unless you were alive back when ZZT originally came out or your really into nostalgic crap you won't want to play ZZT because quite frankly running on a dual-core system that can run modern games decently feels like sitting in a Prius and playing your original clunky grey gameboy while listening to an 8-track.
If you want to know more, check out z2.
On a purely fan-of-the-game note, I'm getting back into ZZT after finding it on my hard drive. I lofe the nostalgic crap that this game brings back so there. Honostly some of the stuff is pretty good for such a simple interface and all that, and I suggest just checking the old bugger out.
To say ZZT is a game really isn't right because it's more of a game creator. It operates on a .zzt world-based file system, and comes with three games that showcase what the game can do and some decent ways to create stories and worlds without telling you outright to copy them. However in front of all of this is the fact that the default super-pastel colors of the game can make you go blind or become impotent. Thankfully, the internet was created and people starting wondering just where the other colors that are in old DOS games were and they were able to create them in the game, opening the pallete to some more eye-pleasing darker tones.
Creating a world in the game is easy, just open the editor and start placing lines down. You'll soon find the need, however, to create an object that does something exciting, or at least what you think is exciting. The Object Orientated Programming (or OOP, not to be confused with POOP) isn't very complex which makes the learning curve relatively low and it won't be long before you're going about creating these fantastic ancient 2-D adventures. Or maybe not.
The simple fact is that unless you were alive back when ZZT originally came out or your really into nostalgic crap you won't want to play ZZT because quite frankly running on a dual-core system that can run modern games decently feels like sitting in a Prius and playing your original clunky grey gameboy while listening to an 8-track.
If you want to know more, check out z2.
On a purely fan-of-the-game note, I'm getting back into ZZT after finding it on my hard drive. I lofe the nostalgic crap that this game brings back so there. Honostly some of the stuff is pretty good for such a simple interface and all that, and I suggest just checking the old bugger out.
Wednesday, June 25, 2008
Welcome, WoW, and Writing
Hey everyone. This is my first post on what I hope to be a pretty active blog. I'm not sure what I'll talk about yet- probably all the things that interest me.
First up, I play World of Warcraft. I don't have a level 70 character, just a 62 in outlands. The newest patch that's coming up will change the level riding mounts are acquired down to level 30. It used to be 40. As a player, I've always thought level 40 was kind of a "woo I get tons of stuff!" level, as every tenth level you get a nice chunk of skills, abilities and usually opens up a new row of talents. It seems like Blizzard is changing the way people approach leveling. Instead of 40 being sort of the 'seasoned warror' level, 30 is quite a stretch. There's a lot of areas around 30 to explore and a mount makes all of that easier. Is it nerfing the game to make it easier for noobs? Sort of, but what mounts are made for is traveling, not leveling. You get mounts to make you appreciate the game's scale. You actually 'waste' a lot of time walking around in the game towards your objective.
I can see people speculating that other skills/etc will get lowered as we get closer to the Wrath release, but really it seems as though Blizzard is just making it easier to get to the new content, much like they did for Burning Crusade. However, it still takes time to get through stuff. Meh, I'm happy, and so are my alts.
I also write quite a lot. Here's my profile on Drytear.net
First up, I play World of Warcraft. I don't have a level 70 character, just a 62 in outlands. The newest patch that's coming up will change the level riding mounts are acquired down to level 30. It used to be 40. As a player, I've always thought level 40 was kind of a "woo I get tons of stuff!" level, as every tenth level you get a nice chunk of skills, abilities and usually opens up a new row of talents. It seems like Blizzard is changing the way people approach leveling. Instead of 40 being sort of the 'seasoned warror' level, 30 is quite a stretch. There's a lot of areas around 30 to explore and a mount makes all of that easier. Is it nerfing the game to make it easier for noobs? Sort of, but what mounts are made for is traveling, not leveling. You get mounts to make you appreciate the game's scale. You actually 'waste' a lot of time walking around in the game towards your objective.
I can see people speculating that other skills/etc will get lowered as we get closer to the Wrath release, but really it seems as though Blizzard is just making it easier to get to the new content, much like they did for Burning Crusade. However, it still takes time to get through stuff. Meh, I'm happy, and so are my alts.
I also write quite a lot. Here's my profile on Drytear.net
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