Comic Talk

Howdy, folks. You doing good? I'm fine, thanks for asking.

Things around here are doing relatively well, as a matter of fact. I actually noticed the other day that we're three months and some change away from the MSX's sixth anniversary. Three months is a while, but time flies, so November will probably be here before we know it.

I don't really have anything else I wanted to talk about specifically, just felt like killing a little time. I'm actually in the process of downloading Alan Moore's Watchmen comics, which come highly recommended by a few comic book fans I know. I still need to get around to downloading Preacher one of these days too. Any comic book with a character named "Arseface" can't be too bad, can it?

I also downloaded Neil Gaiman's Death: The High Cost of Living and Death: The Time of Your Life last week, and I have to say I enjoyed them both immensely. It helps that I really like the Death character; after reading "The Sound of Her Wings" in Preludes & Nocturnes, it's kind of hard to dislike her. And I'm going to have to leave a Note To Self to go buy the TPB of The High Cost of Living sometime. Good reading, it is.

And that's all I've got. Later.

D'oh!

Believe the hype: The Simpsons Movie is absolutely fantastic.

I mean, there's literally nothing bad I can say about the movie at all. I'd call it the movie of the year for sure, and probably the funniest movie I've ever seen. Ever. I mean that. Everything about it is hilarious, even the credits.

I'll give it four and a half stars and my highest recommendation, so go check it out. Right now. I mean it. Run, don't walk, to the closest theater right now and watch it. Seriously. Go now.

Returning To An Old Hobby

Last night saw the second season premiere of Who Wants to Be a Superhero? on the Sci-Fi Channel... and I missed it. Got caught up watching reruns of Supernatural and Justice League Unlimited, so I missed the first run and only got to see the second half-hour of the repeat airing at 11:00. I think that's the way it's going to be that way through the whole season, since I just can't bring myself to miss Supernatural or Justice League Unlimited, even if they are reruns. But thankfully, the Sci-Fi Channel just got done airing another rerun of it just now, so here's my recap as promised.

The episode opens with a quick recap of Feedback's victory last year, before segueing into a recap of this year's audition process. And not unlike American Idol's audition process, we get to see an awful lot of crap before we get to the real nitty gritty. But we eventually get things narrowed down to ten hopefuls...

1. John Stork - "Hyper-Strike"
2. Crystal Clark - "Braid"
3. Melody Mooney - "Hygena"
4. Phillip Allen - "Mindset"
5. Aja De Coudreaux - "Basura"
6. Paula Thomas - "Whip-Snap"
7. Dan Williams - "Parthenon"
8. Ivan Wilzig - "Mr. Mitzvah"
9. Trisha Paytas - "Ms. Limelight"
10. Jarrett Crippen - "The Defuser"

The ten are taken to the lair from last season by Feedback himself, and as they get to know one another, they're soon greeted by Stan Lee himself. But as he welcomes them, he's interrupted by a new supervillain: Doctor Dark. Doctor Dark reveals that he's abducted Stan and has trapped him at a water plant, and that they must split up into two teams if they wish to rescue him.

The two teams of five are then stuck in separate aquaducts, and are given four minutes to open up a series of valves while turning off the wind and rain machines that are meant to slow them down. One team - comprised of Defuser, Ms. Limelight, Basura, Braid, and Parthenon - succeed with only thirty seconds left, while the other team - comprised of Hyper-Strike, Mindset, Mr. Mitzvah, Hygena, and Whip-Snap - are only successful once the time has expired. Doctor Dark shows up on nearby monitors, unmasking to reveal himself to be none other than Stan Lee. Turns out that he'd set the whole thing up as their first test. The whole thing leaves Whip-Snap distraught, blaming herself for their inability to accomplish the task because she slipped and fell during it.

The next morning, the superheroes are assembled and told that a local warehouse has been robbed. Each of them gets two minutes apiece to interview the warehouse's owner and find clues, but the guy spends more time wanting to know every little thing about the heroes and getting information from him ends up being like pulling teeth for them. Turns out this was a secret test too, to see how much they'd reveal about themselves when under pressure.

Leaving the warehouse, the group discovers that somebody's stolen the tires off their vehicles. Around them are a little old lady struggling to put her walker into her car, a delivery man struggling with some boxes, and a lost and frightened puppy. The secret objective was not to get the tires on their vehicles changed, but to help those around them. And while Whip-Snap and Hygena noticed and helped the old lady and only Parthenon helped the delivery man, none of them even noticed the puppy at all. Oh, believe me, Stan's going to give them crap for that.

At the elimination ceremony that evening, Mr. Mitsvah, Braid, and Ms. Limelight are called up to the chopping block. Stan defends his choices, claiming that Mr. Mitsvah was a little too rude to the warehouse owner and not very social around the other heroes, that Braid spent too much time talking about herself with the warehouse owner, and that Ms. Limelight saw the little old lady and completely ignored her. But in the end, citing that he felt she simply wasn't heroic enough, Stan asks Braid to turn in her costume. As the episode ends, we see a suspicious bee-loving lady who I suspect may be a new supervillain.

It wouldn't be fair to judge how the whole season will be on this one episode. I did that last season and I ended up really liking the show, so to think negatively of this one so far may be a bit presumptuous. But so far, I don't think I'm feeling the same vibe I got from the show last season. I'll give it the benefit of a doubt, though, and just like last season, we'll have to wait and see what happens next.

A New Review, Plus More

I've finished that new review I mentioned yesterday, so for your reading pleasure, I submit my review of Ghost Rider. Go check it out, won't you?

Working on this gave me the idea to do a mega-update of reviews of Nicolas Cage movies, since I have about nine or ten of them lined up in my Netflix queue. But I'm not completely sure if that's the next theme I want to undertake for S@TM, since I still want to do a theme centered around video game movies. It all depends on just how I feel at any given time.

We'll have to wait and see, I guess.

Bringing Back Old Favorites

I spoke in my last post about working on a new project, and come Thursday night, I think I'll have another one to do. Y'see, the second season of Who Wants to Be a Superhero? starts Thursday, and I'm seriously considering recapping this season as I did last year's. My recaps of the first season seemed to be popular with all three of my readers, and they were a lot of fun to write, as perhaps you'll see their return in a few days. Besides, I was complaining about my lack of diverse discussion topics before, as this'll be something to help remedy that for a few weeks.

So yeah, look for recaps of Who Wants To Be A Superhero?'s second season starting this weekend. Hopefully this season will be as entertaining as the previous one.

Brief Notes

I'm making some pretty decent progress on the next S@TM entry, thanks for asking. I think it's going to turn out well, but that's really up to all three of my readers to decide.

But anyway, things are moving as slow as always here at Sutton HQ. I've been making some progress on my New Year's resolution, slowly but surely, and hopefully I'll have something to show for it by the end of the year. I don't really want to extend that resolution into 2008, so I'm hoping to take care of this by the end of 2007. I don't think it'll take more than another couple of months anyway, so I'm hoping to be done sometime this autumn, depending on how it goes. But it'll get taken care of eventually, I'm sure of it.

An Idea For A Remake

You know, I've got issues. What started as a simple bit of maintenance on my review of Cry Wolf the other night turned into a full-blown overhaul of thirty reviews that kept me up until 7:30 in the morning, then I woke up five hours later and worked on thirty more until 5:00 in the afternoon. Seriously, don't ask. All I'll tell you is that I have way too much time on my hands and not enough things to do with it.

But that's not what I was aiming to talk about. What I wanted to talk about was the made-for-television remake of Carrie, which I'm watching on the USA Network right now. If you didn't know, yeah, somebody did a remake of Carrie as a TV miniseries back in 2002. It's got Angela Bettis from May in the lead role, which is the most brilliant bit of casting I've seen in a long time. You'd think with her as Carrie, along with a few other notable names in the cast, the movie would turn out halfway decent, right? Outside of those two and maybe two or three really good scenes, there's really not a whole lot of reason to choose the remake over the original. Just because it's more faithful to the book doesn't mean it's any better. Of course, the fact that it was supposed to be the pilot for a TV show doesn't help things either.

See, I'd have no problem with another remake of Carrie if it were given the proper treatment. Of course, given how it turns out in the end, you'd probably have people complaining that it's going to inspire more violence from these idiots who want to load up on weapons like they were friggin' Rambo, march into the local school, and mow down thirty people. But since we live that kind of a society, a movie where a downtrodden, unloved misfit goes completely out of her gourd at the prom before wiping out half the town with her thoughts would make for a gripping social commentary if handled correctly.

I'm not saying I advocate a remake of Carrie. The original film is perfect the way it is, and the version I'm watching now (and that awful sequel that came out in 1999) really didn't need to be made. But if somebody decided to do a theatrical remake, I doubt I'd argue. As long as the movie didn't suck, that is.

One More Review

Have you noticed I've been cranking out plenty of reviews lately? What's it been, three in the last week or so? Four for the month of July? I say this because I've got another one to share: Quentin Tarantino's underrated gem Jackie Brown. So all I have left is Death Proof, and I'll have done all six of QT's movies. Though I do wonder how I'll review Death Proof. Do I review the extended DVD release all by itself? Do I do the theatrical release as half of one long review of Grindhouse? That's going to be a tough call. I'm leaning towards the double-length Grindhouse review, but it all depends on how I'm feeling when it comes time to do it.

Man, I shouldn't really be complaining about how I only talk about my reviews. I've been doing so many of them lately, it's all there's really been for me to talk about. I've got another one lined up as we speak. Thanks, Netflix. I'm going to jump into it as soon as possible, so you can be looking forward to that within the next day or two. Something like that.

Marathon Madness

I was watching some videos on YouTube a little while ago, and they gave me an idea for something I'd like to do one day. In these videos, this guy and a couple of his buddies got together and watched the ten Friday the 13th movies back to back, occasionally recording their thoughts as the marathon progressed. I'd love to do something like that, but since I don't have friends or a way to record videos on my computer, I'm out of luck.

I did, however, consider doing the marathon alone, and making the occasional post about it here at the MSX. That might be good for maybe ten or eleven posts over a period of about fifteen to seventeen hours (depending on whether or not I watch Freddy vs. Jason too). There might be room for more posts than that, I'm not sure. But I don't know how well something that would work, when I could just as easily just do some simple reviews for them over at S@TM. Know what I mean?

I might have to put a little thought into the whole thing. This is probably an idea that looks good on paper, but would probably work out better if I had a podcast or a video blog. (And I don't have either of those, in case you were wondering.) But what would you readers think about something like this? Any interest at all?

They're Coming To Get You, Barbara

Howdy, folks. Welcome back to the MSX. I hope you enjoyed the two Ghostbusters reviews, because I've got one more review for you. This time, it's my views on the 1990 remake of Night of the Living Dead. Go check that out, and have fun reading.

I wish I had more to talk about besides just my reviews. But yeah, I kinda don't. Things move pretty slowly around here, and that leaves me without much of anything as far as content. Which is kind of a bummer, since I love posting here. I've kept this bad boy going for nearly six years, and I'd rather not let a lack of content bring it down. So I'll promise to work on fixing that if you promise to keep reading.

Hopefully I can come up with something else to read besides saying "I did a new review." I'd just open up an S@TM blog if I wanted to do that. But it shouldn't be too hard... should it?

I Want A Proton Pack

Remember me mentioning that I was working on a review, and that there was a chance that I might eventually do its sequel as well? Well, I finished up both movies this afternoon, and I've got them up and ready for the world - by which I mean all two of my readers - to check out. So without further ado, go read my reviews of Ghostbusters and Ghostbusters II. Have fun reading 'em.

Brief Thoughts On A Novel

Happy Friday the 13th, folks. I'm a little bummed because it turns out I'm going to have to miss that midnight show tonight. But eh, c'est la vie.

Anyway, I just finished reading Mystic River a few minutes ago. Despite its flaws, I thought it was really something else. The ending was a real bummer and not a lot felt resolved, but I still think it's some fine reading.

Now that I've finished the novel, I think I may have liked the movie a wee bit more. Of course, that's just going by the small spots of the movie that I actually remember. I really should get around to watching the movie again sometime. It's on my Netflix queue, somewhere around the top ten or fifteen, so it'll probably be sometime soon. Looking forward to that.

But thumbs up for Dennis Lehane's Mystic River. Check it out.

Five To Go

I've got somewhere in the neighborhood of five chapters left to read of Mystic River, and I'll be glad to be done with it once I get past those. It's not that the book is bad; it's actually pretty good. But I just can't handle all these pages falling out. It's gone past bothersome and is heading for just plain annoying.

But regardless, it's still a good read. The only really bad thing is that the book is something of a "whodunit," and having seen the movie, I already know the ending. Though I guess they couldn't have gotten away with changing the book's ending like Fight Club. But whatever. Despite already knowing the ending, I'm still looking forward to seeing how these final five chapters turn out. The book has to be back this weekend, but I believe I can breeze through the rest with no problem.

So we'll have final thoughts on Mystic River in the next few days, I think. We'll see.

Getting Ready For Tomorrow

In case you haven't looked at your calendar lately, tomorrow is Friday the 13th. And as a horror movie fan, it's probably the second-biggest day of the year after Halloween. But unfortunately, I'm not exactly sure yet what kind of plans I've got for tomorrow.

It's become something of a tradition here at Sutton HQ for yours truly to watch one or two of the Friday the 13th movies on DVD. I'll probably end up watching my personal favorite, Part 6: Jason Lives, but I miss the days where half a dozen channels would run two or three Friday the 13th movies back to back. Nowadays, I'm lucky if some random channel like AMC shows one of the crappy ones. Sure, I own all of them on DVD and all but two on VHS, but I grew up watching them on television. All the good parts might be chopped up - if not completely edited out - on television, but there's something entertaining about watching them on TV.

But like I said, I'm not sure exactly what else I'm going to do tomorrow. Normally I'd just hang out all day and watch some DVDs, but something has come up that I might have to get involved in. I mentioned around this time last month that there's an art house theater up in Lexington that runs weekly midnight movies during the summer months, and they've got the first Friday the 13th movie lined up for tomorrow night. I haven't seen any of the first nine Friday the 13th movies on the big screen, so I'm trying to call in a few favors so I can get up there. Seeing the original on a Friday the 13th would be pretty darn awesome. Plus I haven't been to a midnight movie in almost a year, and I've got the jones to see another one.

Nothing is set in stone yet, and I doubt anything will be before 5:00 tomorrow afternoon. But if I'm forced to miss it, at least I've still got the DVDs. And that's better than nothing.

We'll just have to see how things go.

Getting Back In The Writing Saddle

Howdy, folks. I'm not really working on any projects right now, and I don't have a whole lot in general to talk about. Just felt like posting and shooting the breeze for a while. I've said a million times before that I'm not quite fond of doing these little nothing posts, but hey, sometimes you've got to to do what you've got to do in order to better the blog post counts.

Anyway, I could probably stand to get back into the project I was working on prior to starting my X3 review. I'm almost done with it, actually, so I probably don't have to spend all that much time working on it. So that's a big plus, I guess. This particular project also has a sequel that I'd like to do a write-up of sometime, but I still haven't decided if I'm going to start on that immediately after the current project post them together as a double feature, or if I'll just post the first part as soon as I get it done before taking my time with the second one. No big deal either way, but it's something for me to think about before I jump too deep back into the writing game.

The projects never end here at Casa de Sutton, folks. Isn't that always how things go?

More Than Meets The Eye

Went and caught Transformers tonight in Danville. I was never all that much of a fan of the robots in disguise, with that and G.I. Joe being the two '80s pop culture phenomenons that I never really got into. But because the commercials had me hooked and I'm a lover of anything and everything '80s, I just had to go see it.

And I thought it was fantastic. The movie is incredibly light on plot, but everything else makes for an incredibly entertaining movie. I mean, what's wrong with going to the movies just to have a little fun? Not every movie has to be some artsy-fartsy pretentious crap. The comedy is funny, the effects are amazing, and the action is exciting. I really have nothing bad at all to say about Transformers. I'd go see it a second time if I got the opportunity. It's that rockin'.

So four stars for Transformers. Oh yeah.

I Want Mutant Powers Too

Just finished up a new review for S@TM. So go check out my write-up of X-Men: The Last Stand. Have fun reading.

Falling To Pieces

Yeah, that copy of Mystic River is falling apart on me, alright. I was turning a page yesterday, and it and a few other pages popped halfway out of thebinding. I'm afraid the whole thing is going to fall completely to pieces, then I'd probably have to pay for the library's replacement copy. And that's bad times.

I'm about fifty or so pages from halfway through, I think, and if things keeps going the way they are now, I'm going to have to put the second half of the book together like a jigsaw puzzle in order to make heads or tails of it. Isn't that always my luck?

So anyway, happy Independence Day, everybody. Or if you're one of my non-American readers, happy Wednesday.

More Talk About Books

So I've knocked out the first seven chapters of Mystic River, putting me right at 100 pages deep. And while I think the book is really good so far, I've noticed that the author has a propensity to go off on these side tangents - almost like glorified flashbacks - every so often. Yeah, it's good for defining character motivations and establishing a few whys and hows, but I'd kinda like to stick to the main narrative. I really don't need to have a description of a character's first date with his wife in the middle of a scene where that sort of thing couldn't possibly be relevant. But that complaint aside, it's not all that bad of a book.

And I think the Grayson County library needs to invest in a new copy of Mystic River, or work on the binding of this copy at the very least. I was flipping through some of the remaining pages, and a thirty-page chunk just fell out. The entire middle section of the book looks like it could fall out at any time, too. Just my luck, I get a book that, if it were a dog, would probably be put to sleep sooner or later. Maybe I can put it back together with some Scotch tape and hope nobody notices. Yeah... that's the ticket.