Naked Thoughts

This is your (infrequent) daily Pretty Boy update

2012-02-02T08:29:00.001-06:00

"Nights you crave" - the boys @Fashion Milan fw fall/winter 12/13 - feat. "On Off" by Mr. & Mrs. Smith from Livia Alcalde on Vimeo.

"Oh, the Places You'll Go"

2012-01-09T19:18:00.000-06:00

A beautiful recital of Dr. Seuss' "Oh, the Places You'll Go". Sometimes, it's good to be reminded about the simple truths in life.

Miss Mak brings the rain!

2011-12-13T18:43:00.002-06:00

So, Marilyn Mak arrived late Friday evening. Texas responded to the arrival by spilling buckets of rain on us.

Anyway, we whiled away a couple of hours at the Eastside Showroom, drinking various iterations of The Last Word. I think I've pretty much decided that this is my favorite bar in Austin right now. The drinks are always delicious, and our bartender was extremely cute. Closed down the bar and went to IHOP for pancakes, coz what else do you do after you've spent a couple of hours sipping on hooch?

Had brunch with the ex and what turns out to be his new boyfriend (official on Facebook as of last night... I drank a mini bottle of wine in response to that. KAMPAI!) the next day. I was on my best behavior, though I think I may have inadvertently been a little offensive when I cracked a joke about the guy's name. It's Ky, and so I naturally went with "Kentucky". Eh... whatevs... I bought brunch, so I get to be a bit of an asshole if I want to be.

After brunch, Marilyn and I hit up the UT campus for a bit. Then we went to Fredericksburg, TX, stopping on the way at a vineyard (Woodrose) so that she could sample some local wines. She fell in love with the Blanc du Bois coz it "tickled" her throat; it smells very sweet and fruity, but is actually quite dry in taste.

Explored Fredericksburg in the rain, had dinner at Der Lindenbaum, and then ice-cream at the local ice-cream parlor before wandering about a little more and snapping some pics.

Drove home in the pouring rain and by the time we got to the hotel, we were ready for bed, despite originally planning on hitting the Dirty Six. Oops.

Only woke up at 10 the next day when housekeeping banged on the door. Seriously?! We're due to check out at noon anyway, so why couldn't they just wait? Is it so hard for the hotel to furnish their staff with a list of which rooms are checking out that day?

Anyways, checked out, explored the Capitol a little before deciding to go see Pi. Well, Jacob said he wasn't going to be home, but Ky was for a bit, so we decided to have lunch first before heading over. Had barbecue... it was good.

Pi was cute and was rubbing up all over Marilyn. But, as the universe likes to laugh at me, it turns out Ky never left and was at the house when we showed up. Remind the Academy that I should be nominated for an Oscar at some point. Shot the shit a little... why yes, lit major guy, I am quite well-versed in Shakespeare.

Anyway, for reasons best kept to myself, I got irrationally furious about something and needed to go, so we left. I was discreet, as is befitting my snobby upbringing, I suppose. Drove back to Port A so that Miss Mak could experience small town Texas.

Had dinner at Jay's Seafood and Spaghetti Works and whiled the night away on drinks and TV.

Woke up early Monday morning to show Marilyn UTMSI before driving to San Antonio. We checked out the Alamo and the Riverwalk (with a healthy serving of Ben & Jerry's) before dinner at Rosario's. Went back to the hotel and watched Kung-Fu Panda while drinking a little bottle of wine. Found out about the relationship status change during a commercial break, and kept drinking that little bottle.

Woke up at 5AM this morning so that we could be on the road by 7AM, since we wanted to be at the airport by 9:30AM at the latest, and I wanted to give us a little cushion, just in case traffic got gnarly. Which it did, since the entire trip was shrouded in dense fog, and there was a 16 car wreck on I-35 just outside San Antonio.

Made it to the airport in good time (by 9AM), said our goodbyes, hugged it out (TWICE!) and then went to the dermatologist to pick up some stuff for a friend.

Picked Pi up... ex was a little preoccupied and didn't seem to be in the mood to talk so we didn't. Pretty sure Ky was still in bed when I went into the room to pick up Pi's blanket. Which I only did because Jacob was being generally unhelpful and wouldn't bring it down to me.

Left Austin a little upset, but in general, it was a good few days of whirlwind travel.

I leave you now with a little gem that Marilyn introduced me to at 6:30AM today... probably with a pointed hint.

Oh look... sometimes I can be optimistic

2011-11-27T21:38:00.001-06:00

Sappy? Yes. A little cliched? Yes. But that doesn't make it any less moving.
And I'll admit, I miss that feeling that's so evident at the very end.

Music associations

2011-11-17T21:50:00.001-06:00

It's no surprise that we often associate various memories with certain things. It's called sentimentality. So yeah, that distinctive sweet aroma of nasi lemak will always bring me back to when I had my first taste of RM 0.50 goodness (price circa 1995) at the roadside mamak with my schoolmates. Or how the clanging of a bell will always remind me of recess.

Lately, I've noticed that I'm making these associations with boys and music. Let me first preface this by saying that I've only seriously dated one guy (Jacob), and so my sample size is really small. With Jacob, there are several songs that always make me think of him. There's "You Were Meant for Me" by Jewel, because for some random reason, he decided to put it on one morning and was singing it. Then there's "The Fall" by Peter and the Wolf because that's the song he proposed to me with. I'm sure there are various other ones that will trigger memories at some point, but those are the two that come to mind now.

My latest association is with a guy I met in Austin a few weeks ago, whom I met up with this last weekend. This would be Austin Boy, from a previous blog entry. Anyway, we had gone to a house party to watch a friend of mine play in her three lady band, and while the show in general was awesome (check out The Gajeenaz), there was one point where they played a song that he was familiar with and he started singing along with it. That song is a cover of "Wagon Wheel" by Old Crow Medicine Show ("Dragon Wheel" in the Gajeenaz's repertoire). I mean, as I had previously said about Austin Boy, I really like him. But something clicked in that moment, and I realized that I really liked him.

Alas, it's Thursday night, and the last I heard from him was on Sunday, when I was leaving Austin. I've tried calling a couple of times, and texted him a couple of times. No reply. While I initially was willing to give him the benefit of the doubt and grant the possibility of him being busy, I don't think it's that time consuming to reply to a text message, and so I've arrived at the conclusion that he's decided that he doesn't like me and has decided to ignore my calls or messages. Which is cool... I wasn't expecting a relationship or anything. But he's been the first person I've genuinely been attracted to since Jacob, and not just on a physical level... I've enjoyed talking with him and just hanging out. I'm a little annoyed at how much I like him, and how I've now associated him with a song and how I felt in that moment. The confusing thing is that he seemed to like me plenty while we were together, and heck apparently we seemed very comfortable with each other, according to some. Maybe he was really good at faking it. Maybe it was a fleeting connection. Maybe...

Maybe I should just crank out this entry and get over him.

The annoying thing about a high alcohol tolerance is...

2011-10-27T22:28:00.001-05:00

You're only kinda buzzed after an entire bottle of barley wine and 1/3 of a bottle of red wine.
Seriously?!

Dating is... UGH!

2011-10-26T01:20:00.000-05:00

It's been a busy time these last few weeks. And trying to juggle work and a personal life is, well, to be whiny about it, hard. Most days, I'm so tired and over human interaction that I really don't want to deal with people.
What I've learned over the last few weeks is that boys DO NOT EVER FUCKING LISTEN TO YOU.
Period. Full-stop. Period. So many bloody periods that an entire box of Tampax couldn't stop it (how's that for a mixed metaphor?).

The world of homo-dating is ridiculous these days. Apparently, meeting at bars and/or other social venues is becoming less fashionable or something. And I can relate. Jacob and I did meet online over 6 years ago. And since then, with the advent of smart phones and iPads and whatnots, it would figure that you can now date/hook-up/network via those avenues. Cool right?

Yes and no. These things offer a certain degree of anonymity, and as you may guess, that usually translates to less-than-desirable results. Apparently, it's perfectly fine to try and start a conversation by sending a person a dick pic. Not common practice, I hope, but apparently, it happens frequently enough that I guess the benefits must outweigh the cons and rejections. So there's that. We don't say "Salutations!" anymore, we just send people a pic of Lil Petey saluting the heavenly bodies. Say it with me, "OY!"

Then, there are the people from the other end of the dating spectrum who are (rather naively, I'd say) hoping to find true love on these things, and will NOT let go. So far, I've run into two of these freaks. One in a neighboring town and one in Malaysia. Never met either of these people face-to-face, but we had chatted a bit. Next thing I know, I'm expected to send them messages everyday (erm, even my parents don't demand that, you little freak!) and the other one is trying to convince me that he should be my boyfriend, a week after my break-up. Why was I on this thing a week after we broke up? Well, one of the little details I've kept private for a while now, but I'll mention in passing now, is that we were in an open relationship for a couple of months prior to the end. It wasn't the cause of the end, it was a symptom. Let's leave it at that. Point is, that's why I had this "social networking" app on my phone. Needless to say, neither or these interactions ended well, and I'm even more jaded now than before. So much so, that I've adopted an asshole persona when dealing with guys, being painfully blunt about my expectations; i.e. I'm not looking for a serious relationship at the moment... and may not be for a while... I cannot stand serial monogamy. It's just not for me... I enjoy my own space and independence too much.

Then, there's the next variant of guys. The ones who appear cool at first, and then, become clingy and passive aggressive. They assure you that they're not looking to jump into a relationship right away, but ask that you be "sexually exclusive" (WTF, really?! If I'm dating other people, I'll fuck them if I want to). And while that sounds awfully close to asking for some kinda commitment from me, they don't think so. To which I adopt asshole persona again and state quite simply that it's not happening. They say okay. I try to think that things are crystal clear and that we can move on.
And they seem cool and very helpful.
But topics like the future and children keep coming up. And apparently, I'm expected to change my mind re: children in the future because they want them and I don't. And then, they drop you random texts telling you that they're on their way to your place, uninvited. When you respond that it's not okay for them to just do that, they tell you they were kidding, but do that whole passive aggressive "Why you being rude?" thing. I'm sorry, regardless of whether or not you were joking, I had laid out my "No freaks allowed" law several times now, and showing up at my door uninvited veers dangerously close to the Fatal Attraction genre of crazy.
So yeah... this one is riding dangerously close to being of the past at the moment.

While some of this may sound harsh and extremely jaded on my part, it's what I refer to as my "scab phase". The wound of the break-up is closed, but in order to do that, I've put up a barrier of sorts to keep people from getting too close. I don't want them close. In fact, as awful as it may sound, I want them at my convenience. I don't want to talk on the phone all the time. I don't want to feel obligated to text. I don't want to have to deal with other people's shit. I have enough of my own at the moment, and I want my privacy and freedom.
I'm sure the scab will eventually fall off, and there'll be new pink skin underneath. Scarred, but skin nonetheless.
And perhaps, it's because I really don't like any of these guys that much.

As of press time, I have a date (yes, an actual one, not a fuck) lined up for Friday with a half-Asian guy (it might be the first time I'm going rice on rice). Sounds like we're doing dinner, and then a haunted pirate adventure (my idea of a first date tends towards the unusual, for better or worse). Actually, I'm not quite sure if this is a date, but we'll just call it one for the sake of simplicity.

There's this other guy I met at a bar/club in Austin two Saturdays ago, the weekend I was up there to pick Pi up. I was mildly tipsy (had several drinks before I saw him), but the liquid courage made it possible for me to just walk up to a stranger, introduce myself and just talk to him. To be fair, I had noticed him noticing me for a bit before I did that. He and his friend (also really nice) gave me a ride back to my hotel afterwards, and that's the last I've seen of him. But I've spoken to him on the phone a few times now, and he sounds like someone I'd be interested in seeing. And the weird thing is, he's the one I wish would actually call me more often. So yeah, perhaps my indifference is a measure of the degree to which I'm attracted to a guy. But why the hell is he in Austin?!

And finally, I've had a mild flirtation with this guy I met about 3 years ago. He's a friend, but there's always been a mutual attraction, but I was very much still in a relationship back then, so it never went beyond that. Well, of course, he's no longer single, but he still flirts, going so far as to tell me to not be so good at holding back when it comes to hitting on him. But I'm not going to be that guy. The one who breaks up other people's relationships just because his own ended. But still... the guy is cute... but nothing will amount from it.

And so, yes, dating can be summed up quite simply as "UGH!"

Sometimes... why so literal?

2011-10-10T21:41:00.000-05:00

So, as any of you who faithfully (well, occasionally flip to it, perhaps?) read this blog may know, the last month has been a period of turmoil for me (things have gotten a lot better, s'okay).
Well, sometimes, life decides to get pretty literal with you...

Just two Fridays ago, after my PhD. committee meeting, I found out that I was leaving on the research cruise to the northern Gulf of Mexico after all (after months of confirming that I was NOT going). Turns out, one of my committee members loved the fact that I had lab and field data, and that jazzed Peter up, so the next thing I know, I'm being talked into it. I say "talked into it" but it's one of those things where there really was no answer but "yes". Anyway, the kicker was, the cruise left in less than a week... as in we were driving to Louisiana the following Thursday, and steaming out to sea that midnight.
So, turmoil. World gone topsy-turvy.

Next thing I know, I'm driving Pi to Austin on Saturday to drop her off at Jacob's. Was planning on spending the night in Austin at a hotel, and then heading back the next day. Turns out, there was a football game or something, but most hotels in the downtown area were either fully booked, or just ridiculously expensive.
Decided to turn around and head home instead... was back in Port A by Saturday midnight.

The rest of the week was a blur of trying to get my shit together to go on this cruise. It all got done... have no idea how.

Anyway, just as we're about to leave, I find out that there's gonna be shitty waves to contend with. As in 10-foot waves. As in my emotional turmoil will definitely manifest itself literally in a churning blur of puke and misery. Two days of barely eating, a lot of lying down, and a few trips to the side of the boat later, it got better; the sea calmed down from the roiling leviathan's wake it had tried to emulate so faithfully for two days. Yesterday was fine, today was great... eating voraciously. It's looking like we might get out a day early, so we'll probably be ashore by Wednesday afternoon, on the road a couple of hours after that, likely with an overnight stop in Lafayette, LA.

I'm hoping so... But at the moment... all is good. Well, almost... I wish I had remembered to pack an extra pair of shoes so that I don't have to keep wearing the same wet pair. These are specially made to dry quickly, but fact remains, I have damp feet, and I ain't pleased about it.

Post-mortem report: Nearly 3 weeks later

2011-09-24T20:46:00.000-05:00

I'm fine. Learning to live without something that's been an integral part of you for so long is a rather complicated and intricate process of unravelling, unknotting, and unwinding. You realize that so much of you is entwined with the other person that sometimes it's nigh impossible to tell where they end and you begin. And sometimes, there really is no you or the other person; some things were born of the choices you both made, and those are the hardest bits, because for better or worse, bits of you are the product of your past together. And more than likely, those bits will shape how you view future prospects.

I can now say the word "ex". It doesn't make it any more or less real; I was never under the delusion that it wasn't real. But it hurts less to say it. Or write it, I guess.

I saw him last weekend. It was all at once cathartic, confusing, enlightening, vindicating, and also traumatizing. But it was necessary. It provided closure on some emotional level that I didn't think I ever really operated on.

It's become easier to resist calling him. So that's progress. Still not quite able to see this as a good thing yet, though it may undoubtedly become apparent. We're in very different areas of work and having to coordinate that in the future would've been hard on both of us. Also, I guess your mid-20s are a good time to find yourself, and perhaps that's only possible by being selfish and ultimately putting your goals and desires first. All that, I know in theory. It's a reason we're no longer together. But, I'm still working my way towards weighing that as a positive worthy of the hurt.

So yeah, here we are, almost 3 weeks later. Still have all my digits. May have lost some weight along the way (last checked, about 3 lbs lighter, with clothes on), but in no way frail or sickly. Planning an office improvement project to boot. I'm sure there's some cliche re: rebuilding your life in that statement, but it is what it is: I just need to do stuff.

And we come to an end...

2011-09-06T23:36:00.002-05:00

So, some of you may have heard the news, but doubtless, most haven't the slightest inkling of what I'm talking about.
This may, or may not be shocking to you, but Jacob and I ended our 6+ year relationship last night.
Yes, I'm sad. Yes, there's a huge part of me that's confused (we'll get to that shortly). Yes, it's wholly fucking weird. But no, I'm not angry, nor am I bitter.
I'll preface the rest of this post and say that I still love him, and there'll probably always be a part of me that will always be in love with him.
But for now, things just aren't working out. Our paths, interests, goals, and ultimately, our lives have diverged quite a bit over the years, and while I could fake surprise for dramatic license, it didn't come as a surprise at all.
For the sake of maintaining some semblance of privacy and dignity, I'll skip some of the details that I'm not comfortable sharing in public, and are quite frankly, no one else's business.

Long story short, I'm not what he needs at the moment. He's trying to find his place in the world, and he needs space to do that. And sadly enough, the devastating truth came to a head in a phone conversation last night.

I've had the better part of 10-days or so to think things over (he's been away at Burning Man in the middle of nowhere in Nevada, and therefore entirely out of contact). That we were no longer on the same path was something that I had realized for the last few months. There was a shift in the relationship, and unfortunately, it wasn't something that I adapted to very well. I was unwilling to accept the new terms, after trying them out, and he wasn't willing to compromise his self-discovery. And I respect that; we all have to do what's best for ourselves. Ten days of mulling over things, evaluating and re-evaluating and always coming to the same conclusion. There was a moment yesterday that crystallized everything for me, and made me realize that despite the agony it would cost myself (and possibly, him too), it had to be done.

And after a long and painful talk, I got him to admit the words that I had been expecting, and yet, dreading for the last week and half, so often had I rehearsed the scenario in my head at night during my restless and fitful dreams: that he needed space to figure things out, and that those plans didn't involve me. That he loved me, but was no longer in love with me. I'll say this much: as much as you prepare yourself for it, nothing steels you for the vicious bite those words can have. All at once, I was vindicated and felt my sense of worth disappearing... it was everything I expected, and yet, there I was. Hurt and numb at the same time. Correct and wronged.
And yet, I couldn't bring myself to anger. Our parting wasn't bitter as much as it was the aftertaste that made you miss the sweetness before. At least for me. I can only speak for myself.
There were some tears on my part, just enough to realize that the pain was real. Enough that I bit my lip to steady my voice for the last words I spoke that night: "I guess that's it then. Goodbye."

I don't know when I'll get over it. As I'm sitting here writing this, all I want to do is to go back three years to when things were better. I want to hold him again. I want to be his "boy" again. And yet...

I want him in my life. I've never given much thought to what capacity it would be; the answer always seemed obvious. To be perfectly honest, I never got the chance to work out how I felt... so concerned was I with helping him admit the truth.

Was I the perfect partner? No. I was cynical, sarcastic, blunt, moody, demanding, unyielding at times. But I'd also like to think that I was generous, supportive, caring, loving, and accommodating. And as I stare at the carcass of my relationship, I wonder if love should've been enough to keep us going? And if not, then what would have? Was it me? Did I do something wrong? Was I just not enough? When did I become uninteresting? Why did I become less interesting? Does time erode the intriguing bits of a relationship, and leave you naked to stand the unrelenting scrutiny of one that yearns for more than just complacency? Was I always boring? You can see why I'm confused... we didn't address these things. Couldn't... they were ancillary to the more pressing questions. Questions that once answered made all those questions a rather moot point.

For the first time in my life, I feel truly lost. I will reiterate that I still love him, and I don't resent him for any of this, and I don't want anyone to trashtalk him out of some form of loyalty to me. It won't help and I don't want to hear it.

4 minutes of pretty boys...

2011-06-30T07:59:00.000-05:00

For those of you who appreciate beautiful boys... enjoy. It's PG... lots of boys in underwear... pretty much it. And yes, apparently the male "supermodels" of Milan could use some diversity (I think I saw one model of African descent)... but beauty is beauty.

Where's the "fashion" part?

2011-06-25T09:39:00.000-05:00

Before you click on that video below, please be advised that there is a languorous shot of a man's scrotum and that he is masturbating, even if you don't see much other than nutsack.

It's kinda beautiful (the video, perverts), so if you're not offended by nudity or an "artistic not-so-subtle stand-in" for a gang bang... you'll be fine. Needless to say, this is NOT something you wanna be watching at work... well, I guess that depends on where you work, I guess.

But... where's the "fashion" part? I mean, you see some skimpy little swim briefs, and some random snatches of fabric here and there, but I was expecting to see more couture.

X-Men: First Class movie review

2011-06-13T23:30:00.002-05:00

Went to see this with Jacob on Sunday. I will admit, I went it with pretty high expectations, seeing as it had scored some highly positive buzz on Rotten Tomatoes... and I'll start by saying that yes, I quite enjoyed it and yes, it was way better than X3 or X-Men Origins: Wolverine, but no, it never quite achieved the highs of X2.

Let's break it down.

The good: Xavier and Magneto. The end. There's a certain chemistry between the two characters that feeds off the stellar performances of Patrick Stewart and Ian McKellen, but James McAvoy and Michael Fassbender imbue that relationship with a freshness that comes with portraying a much younger Xavier and Erik, respectively. The relationship between the two was the focus of the film from the very start, according to producer Bryan Singer (director of the first two films of the franchise) and they sold it.

Okay, maybe that's not all. The movie is stylish, and I don't just mean the outfits that Michael Fassbender got to wear, though those were some pretty snazzy duds. The entire 60s vibe, the cars, the hair, they sell that very well. But that's all just lacquer. There are some major issues with the film.

The bad: Oh boy... where to start? Erm, the complete disregard for continuity. Since this isn't a reboot, the continuity errors bug the hell out of me. But moving on.
Not a fan of switching out most of the actual First Class members, but I guess due to the continuity set by some of the earlier movies set in the near future, I should at least be happy that they at least respected an element of continuity.

But my biggest peeve about the movie was just how unnecessarily large the cast was when they obviously didn't care to develop most of them at all. As a fan of post-Grant Morrison Emma Frost, I find January Jones' portrayal to be completely WTF-inducing. We're talking about a manipulative, ice-cold seductress, with a snooty air that would put the Queen to shame, and a wit so sharp that it's the perfect complement to her organic diamond form. Instead, we got a blonde in tight white clothes that really didn't do anything at all. Okay, so perhaps the Emma Frost from the Hellfire Club days really didn't do much, but seriously... the woman did NOTHING except occasionally turn into a walking Tiffany's wet dream.

Of all the new mutants, only Mystique and Beast even got anything remotely resembling character development, and even that felt more than a little hamfisted (if I hear "Mutant... and proud!" one more time... *grumble grumble*) and rushed.

Havok pretty much just acted like an asshole and Banshee got what? Ten lines? Most of which were sonic screams? And then... we get to our two non-white new mutants. Let's start with Angel Salvatore. The fact that she's all purty annoys me, since Angel originated from Grant Morrison's New X-Men series which among other noteworthy things, championed the less-than-glamorous looking mutants. Angel was one such mutant being less than attractive by conventional standards: a little overweight with the powers of yep... a housefly. She could vomit concentrated acid that dissolved things, much like how a fly vomits digestive juices to dissolve its food before slurping it up. But here, she's an attractive stripper whose only justification for joining the dark side is that she's more comfortable having her tits ogled than the way people look at her as a freak. Which is fair enough, if it was even packaged believably. But she arrives, seems to kinda bond with her new comrades, and then one incident drives her over the edge? Enough so that she ignores the death of Darwin (okay, so there are theories that Darwin's not actually dead-dead, but we'll get to that soon) at the hands of the guy she then hooks up with? Seriously? And really, Angel served no purpose whatsoever, except maybe to serve as a flying opponent for Banshee in the climax (think the lame Bobby "Iceman" Drake vs. Pyro battle in X3).
And then Darwin... supposedly with the power to adapt for survival gets offed in the most inane and predictable manner possible. And... is the only "good guy" to bite it (yeah yeah... I'm more than aware of the more-than-a-few "the Black guy always dies first" comments being thrown about; the thought did cross my mind too).
I get it... mutants are the new pariahs here. And since most of the early X-Men, and especially the actual First Class were pretty WASP-y, I guess it made sense to encourage social tolerance and acceptance through stories told through their exploits. But c'mon... it's 2011, and the cast of characters has diversified considerably since the days of the First Class. Would it kill people to adopt a little bit of social sensitivity here?

Sidenote: And yes, it's possible that Darwin didn't actually die, but instead mutated into a form that allowed him to survive the plasma bomb or whatever the hell it was Shaw fed him.

The plot was just a little convoluted. It's in no way hard to understand, but it's too densely packed to allow the better moments to properly breathe. Some of the contrivances are a little hard to swallow (e.g. Moira's logic leap from "I saw a diamond lady, and my supervisors won't believe me" to "Let's go find an expert on mutation" required a pogo stick and then some, IMO).

And finally... this is a superhero flick. The climax is the obligatory SFX-laden big battle. Aside from a couple of interesting moments (e.g. Banshee turning his sonic screams into a form of SONAR, Mystique mimicking Shaw), the big battle was pretty much a snore. The urgency was lacking, and quite frankly, the bad guys don't make very scary adversaries. A giant fly, a teleporter and a guy who absorbs energy. Whoop-ti-doo.

Overall: As a whole, the movie's decent... but I don't see what the fuss is all about. It's not horrible, but given the wealth of material to draw from, there shouldn't be any reason for it to be. So, not quite first class, but perhaps business class on a crappy airline?

New Tomb Raider demo from E3 2011

2011-06-11T18:46:00.002-05:00

More Tomb Raider Videos

Yes, I want this a LOT.

New Tomb Raider game!

2011-06-03T13:57:00.001-05:00

First video blog from The Hobbit.

2011-05-09T08:45:00.003-05:00

So excited....!

Perhaps you should pee BEFORE watching this

2011-05-03T09:11:00.002-05:00

Ugh... people are stupid.

2011-04-01T09:09:00.000-05:00

Heard that one from me before? Why yes, it's quite a frequent complaint because people are unbelievably stupid to the point where I want to actually ask them if they ever learned anything at school, or from life in general.

How on earth can functioning adults not comprehend the very basic notion of time zones and how to calculate the time in one zone when given a point of reference? How fucking how? It's a basic addition/subtraction relative to a point. If it were vector calculus, sure, but a simple +/- thing?!
And, this is what gets me... even if you were too stupid to figure that out, a simple Google search will actually send you to a website that actually has a calculator. You simply enter your location, the time of reference, the place of reference, and it tells you what time it will be for you.
Simple, right?

Ugh... people are indeed very stupid.

Alright science fans... ENJOY!

2010-11-17T21:43:00.002-06:00

It was only a matter of time...

2010-11-08T22:31:00.001-06:00

Until I posted something about Glee. Yes, that silly little show where people burst into song all the time.
Season 2 has been annoying me for a while now... mostly with their PSA-of-the-week approach, and the fact that the characters are even more wildly inconsistent than they were in the first season.
However, it's not all bad. The show is more than occasionally charming, and at its best, can completely change how you feel about a particular song.
I kinda hate Katy Perry's "Teenage Dream", but this rendition of it made me smile. Something about a cute guy who sings well... That said, I think it would probably have worked better as a purely a cappella piece.

"Gay guy and his dog"

2010-11-06T16:52:00.000-05:00

Yep... apparently that's how the preteens of Port Aransas identify me. It really helps that they haven't learned to use their "inside" voices when they say it, so you can hear them screaming it as they bounce over to check Pi out. I mean, of course everyone wants a little bit of Pi action. Can't be helped. She's too cute to not command an audience.
But me... I'm pretty nondescript... just walking my dog. *sigh*
Maybe I should dress more like a slob.

DJ Hero 2 or PSA for STDs?

2010-11-06T09:57:00.001-05:00

When I first saw this ad for DJ Hero 2, I actually thought it was a clever take on a public service announcement for STDs. I mean, it gets the point across... that it's quite easily transmitted, and just about anyone can have one.

So, good commercial, or better PSA? You decide.

Happy Halloween!

2010-10-31T02:10:00.000-05:00

I'm a scarecrow

My favorite holiday! An excuse to dress up, decorate with kitschy kiddy attractions ala Scooby-Doo, and eat mass amounts of sweets.

Eyeball mini-cupcakes

Halloween party spread. Purty!

Jack-o'-lanterns

My, what big teeth you have.

CUPCAKES!

Passed. That's all.

2010-09-21T22:21:00.000-05:00

I passed. There were some minor hiccups, like the fact that I never knew what the heck some of the questions were getting at (geomorphology and what it has to to do with tides and currents and whatnot) but it went okay.
I passed. Life is good. Going to bed now. After a shower.
Thanks to all that helped celebrate this victory.

Almost there...

2010-09-18T21:55:00.000-05:00

It's Saturday night. Orals are on Tuesday. I'm not feeling anything right now. It's not calm... it's just that I kinda don't care anymore. I've been on this nervous trip for the past 2 months now that my body has become entirely numb to the adrenaline. That is until it surges again during the actual exam.
But come Tuesday, it'll all be over. Either I'd have passed (yay!), or I'll only have to worry about retaking it next year (kinda yay too).
So Tuesday is the magic day.
We'll see.

Leaving on a jet plane...

2010-08-28T01:30:00.000-05:00

Well, sitting in the Golden Lounge, or whatever room it is that the upper echelon of flyers canoodle in. Must say, the armchairs are pretty comfy. Plus, free internet! Always a plus in my book.
Anyway... to all the wonderful peeps that took time out of your busy schedules to hang out, drink, eat, trade bawdy stories, etc, thank you.
All my pics are now on facebook, so feel free to check them out. I didn't tag every single photo because it just got tedious, but I least tagged one out of the few.
Pics will be on Photobucket when I get back... internet's faster, so that'll make uploading some 200+ photos less painful.

As always, my skin is beginning to freak out. Left index finger now looks like I dipped it in lye to remove the skin, and everything else is papery as hell. Will moisturize... AFTER I'm done with the laptop. Can't stand all that grease getting on the Mac. Ack!

Anyway... toodles!

Some news...

2010-08-17T04:53:00.000-05:00

Some may already know this, but I'm back in Kuala Lumpur. And given the fact that both my parents moved to KL zipcodes while I was away, I am quite literally in KL.
So some updates. Passed the written exams. Well, I conditionally passed Biogeochem (shocker!), with the condition that I pass that section during the orals. Yay freakin' yay!
Anyway, given the shoddy - and I mean fucking embarrassing! - organization of the exams, we only received our official results a whole 10 days after we took the exams. Which would be fine, except that it left me with a 4 day turnaround period to cram for the orals.
Since Peter was out of town, with a full inbox that kept sending jovial (not really) bounced mail messages, I was pretty much under the assumption that I was going to take the orals on the following Tuesday.
Thankfully, he called me on Sunday morning. A snippet of our conversation:

Peter: Who else is taking the oral exam in July?
Me: As far as I know, I'm the only one who's planning to.
Peter: When's everyone else taking it then?
Me: Well, Ken's students will only be able to take them in September when he gets back from the Arctic, and Lee's student can only take hers in October, after he gets back from the Antarctic. And I have no idea when Il-Nam's taking his.
Peter: Why are you taking yours in July then?
Me: Because we wanted to get it over and done with?
Peter: But that's because I thought that everyone was taking it in July. (Way to listen to me, Peter. I've told you multiple times now that people are taking theirs later this year)
Me: No, they aren't.
Peter: Well, then, why rush? Just take it in September when you get back then. You'd be in the majority then anyway.
Me: Okie dokie.

*sigh*

Anyway... I've been back almost 2 weeks now. Seen some friends, went back to my dad's hometown, taken pictures, done a bit of shopping... Not a lot of studying (none at all, to be honest) yet. Pictures are on facebook at the moment, and I'll probably upload them onto Photobucket when I have better internet connection.

Halfway there...

2010-07-19T11:51:00.000-05:00

Today marks a week post the first day of candidacy exams. Basically, two days of exams back to back. Pretty much just sitting about, waiting for the results.
If I pass, I'll be taking the orals on July 27th, and then, flying off to Milwaukee, WI from July 30th - August 4th for a conference, before flying to LAX for an agonizing layover (something like 12 hours), and then I'll be on my way home for 3.5 weeks.
Crazy summer... but I'm still alive, so that's something.

Candidacy exams were a joke. The people in charge didn't even make the slightest effort to mask the fact that it was pretty much a ragfest. Questions were unfiltered, and one section wasn't even edited to maintain font continuity. Said section also had a question that covered material that was never covered in any of the core classes, since none of our classes were focused on theoretical evolution/ecosystems. So that was a shitshow... I think I redefined sci-fi in that question. Apparently, it'll probably be dropped, since it wasn't fair, and the guy who wrote it enjoys being a dick anyway. What peeves me the most (and this part may have been inadvertently transmitted to the attention of some senior faculty members via an angry tirade on my part) is the fact that the question wasn't dropped BEFORE the test. The questions should have been screened by faculty who teach the class before they were presented to us. What irks me even more is that some of the faculty members were aware of the absurd question, since they pretty much all but said, "Good luck, you guys are fucked!" So what gives...

So yeah... still waiting for those results. It's about noon now, a whole week later.

Prince of Persia: The Forgotten Sands game review

2010-06-12T12:58:00.003-05:00

The nitty gritty: It's set between "The Sands of Time" and "The Warrior Within", before the Prince became the dour battle-hardened warrior we see in the latter game. Setting the game in the 7 years between the two games is an obvious choice, but because it is an in-betweener, the story is somewhat limited.

Graphics: Nothing mind-blowing here. Some nice textures, a few interesting environments, but nothing that matches up with the previous offerings. Which is a shame, since the Next Gen capabilities of the PS3 and XBox 360 should have dwarfed anything that a PS2 could handle. I get that they were trying to keep with the style of the previous games in the trilogy, but more effort could've been placed on faithfully updating a classic.

Furthermore, I think it's a little confused as to the tone it's going for. Obviously, it's aiming to be more like "The Sands of Time" or "The Two Thrones" in its color palette, but the gloomy gear rooms, and sewer-like bits are very reminiscent of "The Warrior Within". But the whole traversing rooms deal is rather unimaginative, IMO. It's a complete waste of a much more powerful engine than what they had back in the early 2000s. A little more creativity would have made the levels more interesting to traverse. A thing the previous games did well was providing a good mix of indoor and outdoor environments to explore.

The Prince's animations are also quite lacking. He doesn't seem to move quite as fluidly as the previous games either.

Gameplay: The combat system gets on my nerves. All I had to do was button-mash the square button (PS3) over and over again while occasionally vaulting and kicking. Just to spice things up, I randomly employed the minor powers while battling the hordes. Instead of throwing 50 enemies at me, perhaps upping the difficulty by providing more interesting/difficult enemies should have been the way to go. Sure, the sands here are not exactly the same as the sands of time from before, but I'm sure that an army would have consisted of more than 5 kinds of enemies. There is barely any variety in foes here, and I'm left wondering if trying to get the game a Teen rating had any impact on the creative direction, since the M-rated games featured some more interesting critters, including some naked ones. The boss fights have to be the most inane things ever... Slash and hack at them until they collapse seems to be the trick here, and it's ridiculously simple. Quite insulting too. The final boss fight has to be the simplest that I've ever played. And that whole thing with colored orbs... that's a God of War thing. All three games of the previous trilogy employed a water fountain as a savepoint and a life replenisher. Don't see why this couldn't have stuck to that formula. If nothing else, it would make staying alive a LOT harder, since your lifebar wouldn't be replenished every two minutes.

The biggest draw for me has always been the platforming, and I was pretty disappointed with it here. It's remedial platforming that's lazy. Climb, swing, leap, climb up, rinse, repeat. The only thing that kept things kinda fresh for me is the ability to freeze water. I love the challenge of having to time certain segments so precisely that you have to freeze things at the very last second, unfreeze it after you've leapt off, and freeze the next spout immediately after. The enemy dash ability is kinda cool, until you realize that it's pretty much a mechanic that espouses lazy platforming. Whereas in the past, the Prince would have had to do a crazy number of things to get across a wide chasm, now, all we have to do is hit a button, and he goes flying across the gap, killing an enemy or two at the same time. Having said that, chaining the different abilities together would have been a nice touch, but alas, we're never really given the opportunity to to that.

And the lack of diversity in the moveset is probably the biggest disappointment so far. By the time we got to "The Two Thrones", the Prince had such a varied repertoire that it never actually got boring. I like being able to scale up and down tiny chimney spaces, sneak attack foes, swing on ropes and chains, etc. Now, it's all basically wall-running and swinging, which gets pretty repetitive after a while. And the puzzles have largely failed to actually provide any sense of wonder for me.

Storywise... nothing stellar. As I said, it's pretty much hedged in storytelling.

Overall: This was definitely a wasted opportunity here. They could have made it so much better. Instead, all this amounted to was a dumbed down version of the original trilogy. Entertaining enough, but it definitely lacks the sense of wonder of the previous games, and the repetitive platforming and lousy combat takes away from the experience. B-.

New Mortal Kombat game too?

2010-06-12T12:42:00.003-05:00

Must be the year of Mortal Kombat revival.
Here's the trailer to the new game.

Back to basics with this one, from what I've read so far. Details can be found HERE.
Sounds cool, and from the trailer, it looks pretty good. I like that they're going back to the over the top action of the earlier games instead of the slightly-over-the-top-but-still-kinda-realistic-ish look of the later games.

Mortal Kombat Rebirth?

2010-06-08T14:21:00.005-05:00

Have no idea what this is all about, but it actually looks kinda cool.

Did a little Googling of my own, and found that there was no actual consensus. But the interwebs are buzzing! It's probably smart to go viral with this, get people talking, asking questions, and whooping all at the same time.

I mean, Batman went all noir after some camp, so it wouldn't surprise me if Mortal Kombat headed in the same direction. Coincidentally, Batman was one of the playable characters in Mortal Kombat vs. DC Universe.

Anyway, check out the video below. It's about 8 mins long, and is kinda disturbing... the action's definitely more visceral than the previous movie entries.

ETA: It's been confirmed that this was an effort to pitch director Kevin Tancharoen's vision of a franchise reboot. Read THIS for further details.

Sex and the City 2 review

2010-06-07T22:31:00.004-05:00

The nitty gritty: Girl porn returns with a vengeance, with even more decadent frocks, shoes, bags, accessories, and fashion pastiches.

Review: It all depends on what you go in this for. If you're in it for the girl porn, the trademark quips, puns, double entendres, potty mouthness, the general drama that the four women always land in, then you'll be happy. If you're in this for deep meditation on current affairs, a strong plot, and everything else the show was NEVER about, then you'll be very stupid to walk into a 2.5 hour movie that never set out to be anything other than the former scenario.

Basically, we start of 2 years post-first movie. Carrie and Big are happily married, but Carrie is missing the sparkle (i.e. the glamor). Charlotte struggles to manage a colic-y baby that constantly screams with the help of a braless Irish nanny. Miranda hates her job, and finally quits. Samantha is trying to stave off menopause by taking more pills than Lindsey Lohan on a bender. Well... where to next? Abu Dhabi of course, the "new Middle-East", a mantra recited verbatim so many times, you wonder if Michael Patrick King forgot a lesson or two in subtlety. Why the Middle-East, you may ask? Because the not-so-subtle overarching theme of the film is "tradition". And where else is the role of a woman more traditional than the Middle-East? And what do we basically learn? That some traditions should be respected, even if we're free to make up our own rules. I'm not sure if the intention was to be quite as anti-feminist as all that, but then again, it's Sex and the City. It doesn't take itself seriously, and as an audience, I guess we shouldn't expect it to either.

Verdict: B. Samantha's "Lawrence of my labia" was worth the admission price in itself.

Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time review

2010-06-07T22:04:00.005-05:00

The nitty-gritty: It’s Pirates of the Caribbean meets Aladdin. And that combination makes for what amounts to a shallow romp through Persia, but with none of the emotional resonance of the games that inspired the movie.

Review: The entire film is clunky right from the start. It’s enjoyable, sure, but the narrative is quite weak. The spirit of the games that inspired the movie is largely missing, except for a brief sequence during the siege of Alamut. More on that in a bit. The main problem with the plot is that it feels very much like an early script of "The Sands of Time" game. That is to say that it’s unpolished, with some plotholes.

Although the plot of the movie is inspired by "The Sands of Time", there are elements that reference both "The Warrior Within" and "The Two Thrones" from The Sands of Time saga. There are also plenty of references to the 2008 Prince of Persia game and Assassin’s Creed, both also developed by Ubisoft, the company responsible for the successful reintroduction of the Prince of Persia games. For one, Dastan more resembles the Prince from the 2008 game than the Prince from "The Sands of Time" in demeanor. Tamina is an amalgam of Farah from "The Sands of Time" and Elika from the 2008 game. The battle armor that Dastan wears resembles the armor that the Prince wore in "The Warrior Within", while the “rewind effect” pays homage to the appearance of the Dark Prince from "The Two Thrones".

Where the movie succeeds is in its easy charm. It’s hard not to get swept up in the ride. It very possibly has quite a bit to do with Jake Gyllenhaal’s glistening abs and roguish charm. And that’s pretty much where the movie fails to do more; it relies entirely on devilishly good-looking leads. It’s all textbook. Gyllenhaal’s no Johnny Depp, and so roguish charm he may have in spades, but his character lacks real dimension. The reason "The Sands of Time" was such a compelling game was the Prince’s characterization; he was a flawed hero, cocky at times, but sensitive, and yes quite a bit emo, desperate to win the approval of his father. Removing that sense of vulnerability is what made the 2008 Prince barely anything more than an arrogant braggart, full of one-liners. It’s a pity that Gyllenhaal’s character was modeled after the failed prototype. But it’s not unexpected. This is a Hollywood film after all, and we can’t have sensitive hero-types messing about with the old tropes. That would just be… oh I don’t know, too Brokeback or something.

Where the film most violently fails is in its failure to evoke the spirit of any of the games. There is no sense of wonder at the epic surroundings, mostly because we’re never really given anything to gawk at beyond limited set pieces. I find it ludicrous that a game released in 2003 surpasses a film released in 2010 in terms of visual spectacle. But sadly, it’s true. The only time any effort was made at all to capture the ambience of the game is during a brief scene during the siege of Alamut, where the camera zooms and pans, showing Dastan’s route, which is reminiscent of the pan and zoom effect of the games, showing the path that must be taken. One of the biggest thrills of the Prince of Persia games is the platforming, getting from one level to another in a sequence of impossible leaps, swings, wall-runs, etc. Leveling up is literally, and metaphorically absent for the most part of the film. Instead of taking the plot to new heights, the film seems happy to coast on adequate. Instead of using Dastan's amazing acrobatic abilities for direction, most of the parkour scenes are more evocative of the nature of Assassin’s Creed, where Dastan is constantly trying to evade guards. Once again, the metaphorical blurs with the literal.

The mood of the games is also largely missing here. Yes, we still have the mystical dagger of time, and the sands of time, but these items feel like they’ve essentially been shoehorned in just to give the movie its title. The sands of time bear hardly any threat at all, thus weakening that whole sandstorm of the gods plotline. In the games, the sands were a threat themselves, capable of corrupting any living thing it touched. That malevolence has been removed, more than likely to keep things PG-13, as some of the transformations caused by the corruption are quite gruesome. That said, I find it ironic that the showrunners thought it would be better to have Dastan fight and kill actual people instead of sand monsters for the sake of a PG-13 rating. I doubt it was a budget thing… if this movie was being touted at the next Pirates of the Caribbean, Disney wouldn’t be deterred by something quite as trite as money. That, and a more faithful script would have largely kept the story largely interior, thus reducing the need for multiple expensive exterior location shoots. It’s all about budget management. All that traveling about is yet another hallmark of Assassin’s Creed, not the Prince of Persia.

And finally, that bloody ending! It completely reeks of Disneyfication. Everything gets completely whitewashed. Dastan's actions have no real consequence, other than landing the girl. While I understand that the movie isn't a direct adaptation of the games, there is something to be said about the utter failure of this ending compared to that of a video game. What we have here is the total annihilation of the Prince's journey spanning the three (or four, if you count "The Forgotten Sands") games, where he has to finally learn that he has to stop running away from his problems and trying to fix the past, and rather, face them and the consequences of his actions.

Verdict: B-. Disappointing fare, especially since the creator of the original Prince of Persia, Jordan Mechner was actually involved with the writing.

Erm... all hail Gagalupe

2010-05-31T17:46:00.001-05:00

Happy 23rd, Boy!

2010-05-24T14:41:00.003-05:00

Today is Jacob's 23rd birthday! As per tradition, here's a recent-ish pic (taken within a year) of him.

WTBF?!

2010-05-19T15:17:00.000-05:00

Excuse me while I find a way to get out of bloody Texas. Has anyone seen THIS?! Seriously? What the hell is wrong with people? So, basically, the way of the good Christian god is to be racist, elitist, and xenophobic? According to these people and their agenda, the answer is a resounding "Yes!" and a "Hallelujah!"
I'm more than a little disgusted.

Productive Saturday morning...

2010-05-15T12:44:00.001-05:00

Found these gems.

Random YouTube goodies...

2010-04-29T19:48:00.002-05:00

Kristin Chenoweth is pretty freakin' cool. Some of you might recognize her from her guest starring appearances on Glee. Here she is, singing "Taylor, the Latte Boy". The genius is in her delivery.

And here's Kristin And Idina Menzel singing "Defying Gravity". I saw this live in Austin with the traveling tour, and it was pretty cool. But these two are the original duo. Goosebumps!

Erm... yeah...

2010-03-24T15:56:00.001-05:00

I think that everyone needs to watch this!

I know I will be trying to remember to watch it.

Sometimes, TV amazes me, in a good way. Rarely, but sometimes.

News...

2010-03-18T22:20:00.005-05:00

Two new piercings as of Sunday (March 14th). L-R: Left forward helix and right tragus. Both very non-painful, but then again, just about anything pales in comparison to getting your nipples pierced, I guess. Those have since healed, since I lost the jewelry. Oh well...

Speaking of accessories and gizmos, I bought these guys for pure nostalgia. It's been forever since I had one of these colorful Swatches. And yeah, the pink fish actually moves inside the face. How cool is that? :)

And now, for a random video.

Valentine's Day review

2010-02-21T21:12:00.006-06:00

The nitty gritty: It's kinda like flan. Very airy, delicious, but insubstantial.

Thoughts: Well, the summary kinda sums it all up. It's basically a movie where all the characters are somehow related to each other in some weird way or form. Julia Roberts (who I heard was paid $3 million just for approx. 6 minutes of facetime) is an army captain on her way home for a 24-hour break. En route, she meets Bradley Cooper's character, and they have possibly the best scenes of the entire movie. Jennifer Garner's character is banging Patrick Dempsey's character, and it turns out, that he's married, with a kid. Her best friend is Ashton Kutcher's character, who proposes to Jessica Alba's character on Valentine's Day, only to be dumped later that day. Hector Elizondo and Shirley MacLaine are grandparents to a kid who has a crush on his teacher (Jennifer Garner's character). Meanwhile, Anne Hathaway's character is kinda dating Topher Grace's character, but she's a phone sex operator. Her boss is Queen Latifah, who's Eric Dane's (yes, both McDreamy and McSteamy are in this movie... try not to wet yourselves ladies, for obvious reasons which will become apparent in a bit) character's manager (he's a football player who's kinda fallen on some hard times). Jessica Biel's character is Dane's character's publicist, and she hates Valentine's Day. Meanwhile, Jamie Fox's character is a news reporter stuck with the duty of covering the insipid holiday, and somehow manages to kinda fall in love with Biels' character. As it turns out, Garner's character learns that Dempsey's character is a cheating scumbag, and publicly humiliates him, before running off to be with Kutcher's character, in a turn of events so forced, that it makes childbirth sound easy. Roberts' character turns out to be the mother of the kid who's in love with his teacher, and Cooper's character turns out the be the gay lover of Dane's character (see, told you not to wet yourself). On the other end of the age spectrum, you have Taylor Swift and Taylor Lautner as the most insipid couple you've ever seen. Their mutual friends are Emma Roberts' (Julia's niece) and some random guy's character. There's a lot more crap going on, but I'm a little too lazy to bother.

At the end of the day, the most compelling stories for me were the platonic ones. Roberts and Cooper pretty much stole the show for me, with their brief appearances. The fact that I was completely thrown by the part that he was gay compels me to like it even more, since it really defies common Hollywood logic. Throw an attractive man and woman together, and they don't end up together. What?! But the signs were there all along, and yet I missed them, because I was so caught up in my usual expectations. And hell, I thought she would be a lesbian, but as it turns out, she was just headed home to see her son, which is pretty much as sweet as it gets.

Essentially, it all kinda ties up neatly. It's a saccharin-sweet piece of confection that will not make "classic" status, but is good enough for a rewatch. There are plenty of "Aw... shucks" moments for the hopeless romantics, but for those of us slightly grounded in jaded reality, it does tend to spread itself rather thin with juggling the multiple character stories.

Rating: C+

Do you ever get sick and tired of hearing the most inane conversations?

2010-02-01T20:48:00.005-06:00

... Because I fucking do! Having to listen to the incessant yammering that goes nowhere, self-gratifying reports about their lives that are passive aggressive prods for compliments, etc.
Jesus H. Christ! Shut it already!
No one cares!!! Despite what they may say. Or perhaps more accurately, I don't give a flying chimpanzee fuck. I rather watch an airborne chimpanzee fornicate, for that matter.

Nifty

2010-01-07T14:40:00.001-06:00

parkour motion reel from saggyarmpit on Vimeo.

Avatar movie review

2010-01-02T22:30:00.004-06:00

The skinny: Fern Gully meets Princess Mononoke meets Dances with Wolves meets Lord of the Rings meets Disney's Pocahontas. That pretty much covers it. More specifically, paraplegic ex-Marine gets his twin's job, which was to drive his own custom-made avatar (the avatars are designed from the driver's DNA). He gets roped into a little espionage duty. In short, spy on the indigenous people (the Na'vi), learn their weaknesses, and report back to his commanding officer. Fine and dandy, until the guy predictably learns the way of life of the Na'vi, and (shocker!) learns to love their holistic ways. That and he falls in love with the daughter of the chief and priestess. Moral conundrums ensue, sides are taken, battles are fought and loss, wars are waged and won, good people die, assholes live, surviving good people emerge victorious.

Thoughts: So... James Cameron apparently waited the better part of a decade to make this movie. Hmmm... thank God he did. Had the visuals not been nearly as stunning as they were, the entire thing would've fallen flat due to the highly predictable plot and the reliance on old-fashioned tropes. However, his patience (10+ years!) is richly rewarded here. Everything about this movie is sumptuous. The sense of scale is only probably dwarfed by Peter Jackson's The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, and at that, only because the freaking Battle of Pelennor was HUGE. Despite the epic scale, Cameron's greatest visual achievements are in the details. The design of the flora and fauna that populate Pandora are perhaps some of the coolest things I've seen since Disney's Fantasia. From the tiny floating seed pods that resemble jellyfish medusas to the awe-inspiring winged beasts that the Na'vi hunters ride, the designs manage to be both alien and beautiful at the same time. The ridiculously realistic animations for the Na'vi are the next step for motion-capture technology. Gollum was a marvel to behold, but he was but one creature. The Na'vi are an entire race, and every one is animated beautifully. Cameron manages to weasel out of the whole uncanny valley deal by having them be 12-foot tall blue-skinned humanoids with mildly feline features, but the emotions are truly believable, even when they're hissing their disproval. A nicer touch, which will perhaps be overlooked is the gradual atrophy of Jake's legs, as time progresses. It just adds a subtle layer of believability to a film that is entirely fantastical.

Now... onto the comment about dated tropes and plot predictability. Cameron sure loves his hardcore Hispanic woman with a military background. This dates all the way back to Aliens, where the character Vasquez ran about with a big gun, challenged the boys to all feats of strength and endurance, and ultimately dies a martyr's death. This has been reproduced several times now in the sci-fi genre in particular, most notably in the Resident Evil movie. Funny story... Michelle Rodriguez pretty much reprises her role from RE. Just replace "grunt" with "fighter pilot". A tad bit tired. Then, there's Sigourney Weaver's Dr. Grace Augustine, who again takes the role of idealistic scientist, who scorns anything outside the scientific community, but learns to appreciate the object of her initial scorn. Then you have the reluctant hero, who makes his choice, at great cost to himself and others. And then you have the warrior princess, whose initial coldness towards the protagonist develops into one of mutual respect, and then love. And then, the Native American/African culture bits, complete with shamans, witch doctors, chiefs, warriors, etc. Re: the Pocahontas reference, there is a scene where Jake and Neytiri are swimming. It looks almost identical to the scene where John Smith and Pocahontas are swimming in the "Colors of the Wind" sequence. The environmentally-conscious message about holistic living (ironically, this falling under the "Action/Sci-fi" genre will attract many of the people that the film derides with canned stereotypes). And then the bit where the reluctant hero comes into his heroism, uniting the underdogs for a last hurrah in which many perish, but they ultimately win. All shake-'n-bake elements. All present here.

BUT... then again, which film doesn't play with familiar tropes. Cameron's epic isn't an original masterpiece. It's a piece that takes all these familiar elements, and executes them well. The true test for me, and I'm mildly peeved to say (I was hoping to be scornful) that the film succeeded here - my heart was racing at during the climactic battle. I knew every play before it happened, and yet, I cared. My palms were sweaty. It was cathartic revenge/justice when the rhino creatures stomped on the "bad guys". When the arrows impaled (they were the size of short spears) the opposition. There was dread when I saw the gattling guns. Objectively speaking, RotK was exactly the same thing. Peter Jackson scored then, Cameron repeats here. It's a film that succeeds because of its technical prowess.

Final verdict: Long story short... very pretty movie. Engaging, though highly derivative (check out the list of references in the first sentence). A-

Christmas in Fort Worth, TX

2009-12-29T14:01:00.005-06:00

Christmas was... a hot mess. Not literally. As you can see, it was cold enough for snow. In Texas! A shit-load of white stuff too. We made a snowman the last day we were there.
Back to the mess. Things were pretty much the same as always. Loud, bratty, ungrateful kids. Dirt, scum, overall filth. I had to scrub the bathroom on Christmas Eve morning because it was so filthy. Jacob and I made an early morning Wal-Mart trip (yes, Wal-Mart... the hub of Saginaw) to buy Comet, gloves, handsoap, and scrubbing pads. Things you'd expect to find in any household, but we couldn't find any. So I bought some. And then proceeded to scrub the bathtub, toilet, and bathroom sink. You'd be amazed by how much filth there was... I left all the supplies behind (don't think I've ever used Comet on my own bathroom ever) but I doubt they'll ever be used again.
All that snow pretty much happened on Christmas Eve. Driving in the snow... not so much fun. Kinda scary actually... never let off the brakes!

Christmas was a fiasco. If there was ever the embodiment of how disgustingly corrupted Christmas is these days, this family would be it. I simply don't see the need for each child (the youngest two) to have multiple presents. And when I say multiple, I mean something in the order of 15-25 presents each. From just the immediate family. And they claim they're broke, and can't afford to help out with Jacob's tuition. The kicker, the ingrates had already been through their presents, and so knew every single one under the tree. They even knew what presents were kept locked away, and kept trying to make sure that the parents had gotten them the "right" one. "Is it the Chocolate Touch?" Seriously? If I were 12 and getting a cellphone, I wouldn't be making demands. And apparently this behavior is tolerated. If we ever did Christmas at home, I've got more than a sneaky suspicion that my mom would've taken away all the presents and sent them to our less wealthy cousins.
Just another reason for me to not like Christmas.

Oh, and blatant racism is also tolerated in the house. John's a bloody racist who constantly goes off about how there's a "gorilla" in the White House. To further prove his conservative ideals (in this case, it refers specifically to his beliefs on gun laws as well as racism), he bought his eight year old son a video game that is more than likely rated "Teen" or "Mature", and involves running around and gunning down "Mexicans". And BB guns with pellets and gunpowder paper. In the hands of any other kid, perhaps, but in the hands of the demon child and his sociopathic personality, that's just not cool. As we're about to leave, the demon child decides that it's okay to say "Can I go now? I want to go kill some Mexicans", in the presence of Jacob's sister-in-law, who is Hispanic. Seriously?!
When is that ever okay to say? Needless to say, was very relieved to leave.

Finally...

2009-12-19T14:41:00.001-06:00

... sat down and started a separate blog for my Buffy reviews. Just finished transferring nearly 30 posts over there... so it now looks like I've been a very industrious blogger for the month of December 2009.
We'll see how long that illusion lasts. :)

Pi was in a posing mood today...

2009-12-06T23:52:00.003-06:00

Uncharted 2: Among Thieves

2009-12-06T22:19:00.004-06:00

Got this in the mail a while ago (much better deal on eBay than retail), and played it extensively for a weekend, and then life caught up. Finally got to play it again today, and I finished it!
Overall, fantastic game. Great fun, wonderful voice acting, atmospheric score, wonderful attention to detail, and an engaging plot.

Gameplay: Overall, the learning curve is pretty smooth... things start out pretty easy, and progressively get more difficult. The combat system has been tweaked some, and it's much improved from before. Platforming is still ridiculously simple, but the attention to detail is astounding. The only thing that detracts from the experience at times is the wonky camera. Exploration is encouraged by placing random "treasures" all over the place, and the pace is quite well-balanced to allow exploration that is punctuated by gunfights. Puzzles are generally simple, and therefore rarely break the pace too much. Clues are always present in Drake's journal, which is amusing enough to read just for fun anyway. The game keeps things interesting with a variety of action sequences, from your run-of-the-mill type gunfights, to having to balance yourself while killing enemies - while the building you're in collapses and slides, to fighting off terrifying foes that just don't seem to die.

Graphics: The character models, both in-game and cutscene ones, are quite remarkable. Sure, there's still the occasional glitch that reminds you that you're not looking at real people, but the animation is pretty expressive. The environment is painstakingly detailed and lush. Uncharted 2 continues to use that stylized realism from the previous installment, infusing everything with a saturated and lush palette. The large-scale environments and giant puzzle pieces come pretty close to rivaling the latest Tomb Raider adventure... however, the puzzles are a lot less involved. They look good, though.

Sound: The score continues to be one of the best I've ever heard for a video game, rivaling the Tomb Raider franchise in yet another category. The voice acting is top-notch again, lending even more realism and credibility to the fantastic animation work. The score keeps up well with the gameplay, changing to reflect the overall tone of the moment. The lush soundscape is punctuated with details that make every locale all the more real, from birdcalls in the jungles, to the soft ring of windchimes in Tibet.

Plot: A detailed summary can be found here. It's pretty much your usual globetrotting treasure hunting caper. This time, the story begins with the quest for Marco Polo's lost fleet of ships, rumored to be carrying a huge cargo of treasure. This becomes a quest for the Cintamani Stone, which eventually leads Drake to Tibet in search for the lost city of Shambhala. If all this sounds pretty epic, it's because it is. Thankfully, you've got a regular Indiana Jones-type character at your control...

Overall: A-

Buffy Season 8 #30

2009-11-14T11:41:00.004-06:00

Finally, the much anticipated #30. Overall, brilliantly conceived, but not so well executed. It’s still much improved from the somewhat dismal #29, though. Still in the middle of the war raging on in the Tibetan countryside, Buffy and Co. realize that the wrathful goddesses that they summoned earlier are very good at being wrathful and very destructive. Problem is, they’re on no one’s side, stomping, destroying, and killing indiscriminately.

Art: As in with most of “Retreat”, Jeanty’s blocking isn’t as good as it used to be. It may be attributed partly to the fact that he doesn’t enjoy drawing the war stuff. In general, though, the message is conveyed pretty clearly. Where there seems to be a problem with the art now lies predominantly with Madsen. Like in #29, her mud/dirt details just seem to be slapped on, with no real texture or grit. The same can be said about her camo work, which is pretty bad. But the biggest crime here lies in the Satsu/Kennedy confusion, simply because their outfits keep getting swapped.

First Kennedy is wearing the orange shirt. Presumably the same shirt she was wearing in #29. Then you see a girl wearing green pants and another wearing pink pants helping flip over the overturned jeep. The one in pink is presumably Kennedy, since she was last seen wearing pink pants. The girl in the pink hops into the jeep with Buffy and Willow. However, the driver looks very much like Satsu. Same hair, same features the way Jeanty draws Satsu from afar. Which would explain why Kennedy is with Faith, back in the temple. She’s the girl who asks, “Are we going to get our powers back?” But didn’t Kennedy hop into the jeep? Evidently not, because now the girl driving the jeep is wearing GREEN pants! But she’s wearing an orange shirt! Flashforward to Buffy’s speech, Kennedy is wearing an orange shirt, and Satsu a green one, and a chunky purple beaded necklace that’s never seen again. But Satsu is now wearing saffron yellow pants. While I understand costume changes, it’s kinda ridiculous for the characters to be changing clothes constantly, one time apparently in the jeep! If the likenesses weren’t so good, I would consider them unknown Slayers (but the quickie change in the jeep is still unforgivable… unless the girl wet herself).

That said, I really liked what Jeanty did with the scenes with the goddesses. Focusing on just their ankles as the jeep weaves its way through the battlefield is a good way to emphasize scale, as well as hide the goddesses’ privates. There’s also a sense of Jurassic Park-ness, with the jeep weaving around the giants. That said, Jeanty’s forte remains in his character work. The scene between Buffy and Riley is very well executed, as are the ones with Bay and Oz. Jeanty’s Buffy remains as expressive as ever; the shock and horror that registers on her face as she realizes that the goddesses aren’t on their side is completely believable. The resolve on her face when she addresses her army is palpable. With a month off, here’s hoping that Jeanty can truly return to form for the next arc.

Writing: Much improved from the last issue, but with some issues to iron out. Espenson is simply not well-suited to the medium. It’s hard to pinpoint exactly what gives that impression, but the writing is just clunky. Thematically, however, #30 works. The “WTF?!” moment that had been heavily anticipated and discussed can be summed up as such: "Oh, my god that's brilliant! And why didn't I see that coming?” Buffy is hit by a huge amount of magic from a powerful goddess. When she wakes up, she begins to float into the sky. Buffy’s flying and it's absolutely brilliant. Because Buffy's eventual ability to fly has been foreshadowed by Whedon this entire season. First, when she flies with Willow in “Anywhere But Here” and is too afraid to open her eyes. Next with Twilight in “A Beautiful Sunset” where she grits her teeth, bearing it because she must. Then we have her jumping off of flying cars in “Time of Your Life Part II”. Then as a flopping fish in “Retreat Part I”. Let’s also not slight her courage in leaping off a skyscraper in Tokyo to save Willow from Kumiko in “Wolves at the Gate Part IV”. She'd been progressing to this point of being able to deal with this power the entire season and no one saw it coming! It was all right there, laid out in front of us - the story had been building up to this point for a long time, but it still came as a complete shock.

The latest developments will probably play a part in how Buffy will be able to face Twilight. And it's such an awesome metaphor that only in giving away power, can one truly know power. It's like that saying, if you love someone, set them free. If they return to you, then your love is true. You cannot be caged by your love or your power - through being open, you can be connected to true power. There's a thread of transitive power underneath this entire season and it’s becoming quite apparent now. That perhaps after you've been given power you shouldn’t cling too tightly to it, but that you set it free so it may choose to return to you. If it's truly yours, it will return to you. And isn't that very Tibetan-style, only in letting go of everything can you truly know yourself and fully actualize. The Buddhist prayer of "letting go, always letting go" that will lead you to enlightenment.

Hughes' cover makes so much sense now. When Buffy was Called, Excalibur was forced into her hand. It was a burden to carry the sword or in Buffy's case, the shining stake. Another interesting parallel to note is that in many tellings, Excalibur is engraved on both sides; one side with the command “Take me up” and the other with “Cast me away”.

I've also gotta say that this new power is something I'm not sure will be unwelcome or perhaps gladly received. Buffy's been saying this arc how she's tired of standing over people. Well, now she's flying over them. It's an ever greater price to pay for great power, the disconnect between her and humanity. Flying in past was shown to leave her as a helpless pawn. Now, instead of her in another's power, she can fly on her own. And this gives Buffy something she's always wanted - freedom. That's what flying symbolizes to me. Physical strength symbolizes to me power. But flying has always seemed to strongly represent freedom. And this is what Buffy's wanted ever since her character was first introduced.   Buffy enjoys having power, but she's always wanted freedom. Being able to fly is perhaps a way for her to have a more balanced give and take with her powers. Because while flying does involve distance, there's also the joy of this perspective and the freedom and thrill of it.

A couple of other interesting things to note. It seems that the Summers women share a common intuition. Dawn, like Buffy realizes that the goddesses aren’t on their side either and calls for a retreat. It’s also interesting to note that there is a vague revisit of “The Long Way Home Part IV” in this issue. In “TLWH IV”, Buffy orders Satsu to go for the wound, unless people got stupid. It showed Buffy’s compassion then. Even in a dire moment, she still held to her creed as a protector, not killer. This compassion is evident again, when she orders her army to help all the injured, regardless of their affiliation. However, Satsu is forced to kill a sniper who was about to shoot Buffy. Guess he was stupid for trying to mess with Satsu’s girl…

Also, Riley is finally vindicated, or at least appears so in the revelation that he’s been working for Buffy all long. His motives for doing so remain unknown, as is the whereabouts of his wife. Ex-wife, perhaps? Dead wife? His giant Twilight sigil also seems to have faded, though I think that’s mostly an artist oversight.

All in all, a pretty satisfying end to a very uneven arc. But the promise of what’s to come is tantalizing.

~ Emmie and Xi

Pumpkin Carving Party 2009

2009-10-25T10:53:00.002-05:00

Book review: The Lost Symbol

2009-10-17T16:25:00.003-05:00

Unless you've lived in a cave in the most remote Tibetan region the past decade or so, there's no way you haven't heard of Dan Brown. Or The DaVinci Code. Or Angels and Demons. Both of which have been made into movies starring Tom Hanks (ack!) as the protagonist, Robert Langdon. This is Brown's third romp with his popular character, this time sans Christianity (guess the Pope finally bought him out), but still full of Freemason mumbo-jumbo. Which is fascinating... to a point.
Finished this a couple of days after I received it (too cheap to pay for shipping, so I just went with the free shipping option) and hmmm... I'll be the first to admit that I like books that are really easy to read during the school year. But this one... way too easy. I was calling out events before they happened, going by the formula that Brown adheres to like stink on shit. And adhere he does, to a fault. Even his plot twists and cliffhangers feel stale. The story is a fast-paced thriller, much like his claims to fame, but having already read Code and Angels and Demons, the freshness is long gone.
Nevermind the style of the prose, even the plot elements are recycled. Again, like in Code and Angels and Demons, the antagonist is a sociopathic, masochistic, sadistic zealot. Again, Langdon's sidekick is an attractive woman who's superficially written as intelligent.
But the fault I take issue with the most is the indulgent self-referencing that Brown does with the grace of a lumbering giant in stilettos. I'm sorry, we've all read your previous books before; there would be no real reason to really get all excited about this new book if we hadn't, so stop going, "Oh PS: that one time in Rome, when I played cat-and-mouse with a psycho, etc etc etc".

So... verdict? Read it if you liked the previous Brown books. It's not at all different.

Rating: C+

Buffy Season 8 #29

2009-10-11T09:35:00.002-05:00

And so we reach the penultimate chapter of Espenson’s arc. What happens? Twilight’s goons meet the depowered Slayers in a head-on battle, complete with MANPADS, Chinese assault rifles, and pretty much not a chance in hell for Team Buffy. “Yeah, I’m starting to think there’s a reason no one’s written a suspense novel where the conflict is wolves vs. tanks” pretty much sums it up.

Art: Kinda torn on this one. There are some panels of brilliant story-telling narrative, but it doesn’t quite hit the high notes of the previous issue. Part of the problem is presenting the scope of a battlefield. The strongest panels in the midst of all the chaos are the ones that focus on the character moments. Jeanty’s ability to tell the reader what exactly is going on in Buffy’s head is the highlight of the issue. And the couple of panels of Faith preparing to go into battle, when read with the context of the Buffy/Faith conversation in the previous issue really made me feel for Faith.

Things to pick out:
1. Andrew’s Union Jack jacket makes a comeback.
2. The Wiccan girl with the Mickey Mouse ear-hair is back. If you’ve no idea who I’m talking about, she’s in #1 in the first panel we see of Xander standing in the Scotland command center. She’s one of the two girls generating a glowing ball between them. She’s also seen in “ToYL”, in the panel where Rowena commands the Slayers to obliterate the snake-demon army.
3. The return of Buffy’s pigtails, albeit temporary.

Writing: After last month’s solid issue, Espenson’s script was quite disappointing this time around. The story moved along fine, and there was a fine mix of drama, action, and laughs, but the gripes are in the details. There are several instances of rather awkward dialogue transitions. For one, the transition between Oz asking Bay to hand him the baby, and Willow exclaiming “No! Don’t protect the baby!” is odd. Perhaps the art doesn’t quite translate the scene, but it doesn’t look like Oz is asking for the baby to protect him from Willow at all. The other instance is during the discussion about “noise” vs. something real. It’s a rather big leap to go from discussing RADAR to “Hey—the two of us – we never had magic.” I get what was being expressed, but it just seemed like a random outburst to me.

And again with the bloody inconsistency with the spelling of “magic/magick”! Yes, some have stated that “magics” is probably not acceptable, thus “magicks”, but why use “magickal” then when “magical” is wholly correct? Especially when the blurb on the inside cover uses “magical”. Editorial fail again?

Another thing is just the random waste of certain characters. Faith and Kennedy feature quite prominently in several scenes, and yet their lines are mostly throwaway ones that could’ve been given to just about any character. Faith, particularly, feels wasted, kinda like she was towards the end of S7, except even more so. The only scene in which she felt remotely consequential was in the scene where she prepares to go to battle. The Monroe sidestory just seems like a random addition now. I was hoping for something more substantial than just having werewolves help out in the battle. Speaking of editorial fails, why the hell in Monroe alive? Bay specifically mentions her regret for attacking him in #27 because it may have made him a martyr. Implying that she killed him. As in ripped out his throat. Monroe was shown lying on the ground with a ripped out throat, while his werewolf buddies skedaddled and left him behind. And yet he’s alive and well? And Andrew’s little special assignment… well that was an utter waste of yak hair since it didn’t come into play at all!

Final thoughts: Interesting that it’s implied that it is Buffy, not Willow, who unleashes the wrathful goddesses. In light of the solicitations for #31, her decision here will come back into play. However, to give credit where it’s due, it is Buffy who once again thinks outside the box for what seems to be a solution. It also seems that Buffy is now done “retreating” and is now going “full-throttle forward”.
Sidebar: Remati is the other name for Palden Lhamo, so whoever pointed that out over at Whedonesque was right. Funny thing is, only Remati (of the three goddesses mentioned) is usually considered wrathful. Vajrayogini is usually associated with “methods for preventing ordinary death, intermediate state (bardo) and rebirth (by transforming them into paths to enlightenment), and for transforming all mundane daily experiences into higher spiritual paths” (Wikipedia). Ekajati’s “ascribed powers are removing the fear of enemies, spreading joy and removing personal hindrances on the path to enlightenment. Ekajati is the protector of secret mantras and "as the mother of the mothers of all the Buddhas," represents ultimate unity” (Wikipedia). Now… Jeanty mentioned that Espenson had done a bunch of research on these goddesses, so I hope he’s not overselling her efforts here, and that her choice in goddesses will come into play soon, presumably in #31. Aside from Remati, the other goddesses play a role in assisting in the achieving of enlightenment, and Ekajati is supposed to represent the ultimate unity. Perhaps they can show Buffy the way to achieving a more holistic unity of Slayer and person…

~Xi

New Q&A Session with Georges Jeanty at SlayAlive.com

2009-10-07T00:16:00.003-05:00

Hey.
Anyone reading this who happens to be following Buffy Season 8, please feel free to submit up to 3 questions at a time to Jeanty.
He's been gracious enough to agree to do this on a monthly basis, and I'm immensely proud of the success of the past Q&A sessions. If you're interested, click HERE to be linked.
If you're not interested in joining the forum in order to submit a question, send me an e-mail at wenxina@slayalive.com, and I'll add your question to the queue with credit.
Thanks.

Buffy Season 8 #28

2009-09-02T22:50:00.001-05:00

Part 3 of Espenson’s “Retreat” arc… and I think we’ve finally struck gold. All-around gold, but there will be plenty of praise for the key players. What do we have here? Basically the calm before the storm. With the exposition that was #27 out of the way, we’re now able to get down to the single element that makes the Buffyverse so compelling: i.e. the human aspect.

Art: Jeanty provides us with some of his strongest pencils since “A Beautiful Sunset”. There is a sense of motion throughout, and his likenesses are pretty consistently strong. This being an Andrew-centric issue (most of the issue unfolds from Andrew’s perspective behind a video camera), Jeanty is particularly good at Andrew. But his characters don’t just look good, they “act” like the characters would on screen. The tenderness in the scene where Xander is examining Buffy’s hand is palpable, and Buffy’s face when she says, “You think? I can feel more now” expresses just the perfect mixture of trepidation and insecurity. What follows is a wonderful blend of child-like content, punctuated with longing. The moment just plays on perfectly, and because of the detail to little character ticks, it all feels alive and yanks at your heartstrings. What’s even niftier is how upon rereading the comic, seemingly inconsequential things add more to the scene. Amy the cat, can be seen hovering in many of the panels, but my personal favorite (see if you can detect my bias) is when the cat scares away the little puppy in the Willow/Oz scene. Cats are evil… it’s official now!

An obvious difference between the last issue and this one is how the clever pairing up of characters has significantly reduced the strain of having multiple characters clutter up a scene. As a result, there are a lot less wideshots, and many more close-ups, which is fitting, since the focus here is on trust and connection between the characters.

Madsen should be commended again for her atmospheric colors. In moments of openness and honesty, we get her usual bright, saturated palette. Scenes that contain distrust are oftentimes, for the lack of a better word, shady. This is most obviously seen in the Andrew/Giles scenes. It is also perhaps symbolic that when Willow is about to leave Oz in the room, she’s exiting a space of brightness, and about to step into the dark. Oz’s renewal of her faith keeps her in the happy place.

Pop culture note: Aside from Andrew’s Bobba Fett hoodie, a couple other Dark Horse franchises make guest appearances. In the panel where Andrew is rummaging through his stuff to find the video cam, Hellboy and an Alien figure can clearly be seen. Also, Sesame Street’s Count is clearly seen on Buffy’s t-shirt during her bonding session with Faith.

The art is nuanced, quirky and delightful with an incredible attention to detail that only raises the standard of strong characterization. (Faith’s disappearing tattoo notwithstanding. Maybe she’s just following Angel’s example on the path to redemption. Step one – stop killing people. Step two – remove tats.)

Writing: Jane Espenson delivers a ridiculously dense and multi-layered script that actually translates beautifully, unlike her previous work in “Harmonic Divergence”. In what is proving to be a game-changing arc, Espenson successfully expounds on what was meant by letting the power through you into the earth, as well as establish some key character moments.

Slayers aren't repressing their powers, but letting the energy flow through them and back into the Earth. The “poison” is bottled up in supernatural human beings, like the Slayers and Willow. It's not repressing power, but letting go of power. But the question remains: what is the source of this power and is it inherent to a person? Is letting go of power perhaps letting go a bit of their identity? This is what Willow fears, but Oz reassures her that she's still Willow Rosenberg without the magic, assuring her that she “can be done”, that she too can have a life, something which Willow resents him for having.

This desire to let go ignores the fact that the world is in danger of being destroyed every May (if not several times a year). The power that Willow sought and now struggles to let go of was something she chose. She chose to arm herself with this power in order to help Buffy fight the demons and save the world. Just as the power consumed her once before during her dark arc, here too we see the negative consequences of her choice to fight alongside Buffy – she feels she cannot have a family or a normal life.

Power, by its nature, is not evil. Having power doesn’t define you; how you use your power defines who you are. You are what you do, but your power is the tool you use. It’s a puzzling and panicked logic that leads to the Slayers feeling "weak,” having let go of their power, and leaving themselves vulnerable to Twilight coming with all kinds of pointy and explosive weapons.

It is perhaps telling that the most vocal “malcontents” are our three lesbians: the witch who granted the Slayers their power, and the two Slayers who have most ardently embraced their power. Perhaps hiding who you really are and turning the other way may not be the best solution. Kennedy sums this up best: “It’s bull$#@&.” Is this just merely a moment of weakness? Faith makes it seem so: “It got to me. What we had to do. What I had to do. I’m not strong enough to have to be that strong.”
.
Where will this lesson lead? Will it be another Helpless where the Slayers are without their powers and instead rely on their wits to defeat their enemy? Perhaps in realizing that they don't need their powers to survive, they'll realize that the power isn't who they are, but what they use to become who they choose to be. Just as a person would go to medical school to become a doctor, arming themselves with this knowledge, so too will a warrior arm themselves with weapons to fight.

This issue also puts into perspective the criticism that #26 felt too rushed and jam-packed. Deliberately so. Here we have the very literal slow-down effect. The world slips away and the characters are finally interacting on a deeper level. Connection. The frantic pace of #26 retreats into the flashbacks and exposition of #27 and the promise of a solution. We see this potential realization of a life without magic and what it brings - deeper connection, something Buffy’s been desperate to feel for a long time (“Connection. Why can’t I feel it?” – “A Beautiful Sunset”).

This deeper connection doesn't come consequence-free. Feeling more, besides the ability to feel happy, means you're more vulnerable to pain, both emotional and physical. Buffy gets this one-two punch at the close of the issue, first witnessing Xander and Dawn's romantic liplock just as she was seeking out that deeper connection with him, then leading to Twilight's army discovering their location. The battle is imminent. Will their defenses be enough without magic and Slayer powers? Doubtful. Which means more emotional and physical pain is coming. And that’s where a Slayer lives and breathes.

What’s next? Warriors, by their nature, don’t retreat for good. They retreat in order to rally for the next battle to come. The Slayers may have laid down their power and with it their most powerful weapons, but not for long.

It’s interesting to have the issue about rooting out the truth told by Andrew, the one whose looser grip on reality has been called into question in the past. Now it’s Andrew who is questioning everyone’s loyalty and consequently becoming a less likely suspect – reestablishing and betraying trust. This happens repeatedly through the issue. First, with Buffy and Faith bonding over the need to rest and be normal segueing to the intimate scene between Xander and Dawn who talk around what they’re really trying to say. Flirting with the topic and each other, much? Then Xander and Buffy connect and share the secret of what happened to Willow in the future – their trust in each other having never been stronger or more intimate. This revealed secret leads to Andrew questioning Giles, then Giles questioning Willow. This loss of trust in Willow is restored with serene faith from Oz when he hands over his son, Kelden, into Willow’s hands. More trust in Willow follows with Buffy’s confession of killing her in the future and Willow’s immediate trust in herself that everything will be okay and she’ll work harder at the “no-magic thing.”

The Scooby Core is strong in this moment, Xander’s trust in Buffy leading to Buffy’s trust in Willow and Willow’s bolstered trust in herself thanks to Oz reverberating back down the line. Buffy seeks to complete this circle, going to Xander to tell him how her conversation with Willow went as he’d made her promise and here comes the final betrayal of trust – Buffy walks in to find Xander and Dawn together, kissing. Her best friend, one of the “people that [she] loves[s]” and might have started thinking about in a more intimate way, and her sister, who represents all the normal that Buffy wants in her own life. Buffy’s expression, shock and hurt and “feel[ing] more”, fades back into her stoic general’s persona. The cycle of trust is stymied, but not yet broken.

~Emmie and Xi

Yay! Passport!

2009-08-31T19:52:00.003-05:00

Received my passport in the mail today! Can't express how bloody relieved I am... now, for the visa.
Need to call the Embassy up and see what's up with that, how to apply for it, and all that jazz.
So many hoops to jump through... but back to the passport for a second.
It's so shiny and new looking... with a nice hologram thing on the inside cover.

Tanggal 31...

2009-08-30T21:34:00.003-05:00

If not for the disgraceful display by a handful of morons recently (think carting about a cow head), I'd be a little prouder to be Malaysian.
Thanks for killing the buzz, assholes. And thanks for not doing anything about it, Najib, other than issue a few rhetorical comments with no follow-through. I find it ludicrous that news articles were written with quotes, names, and photographs, and nothing has been done about a bunch of Quran-brandishing would-be anarchists. Seriously? What else do you need? Their bloody MyKads? Thumbprints? 5 male witnesses? God's giant pointer finger? Methinks all you'll get is the divine "up yours".

Band together to demand a fair election, equal rights, etc, and get your ass hauled to jail.
Run around with a severed cow head proclaiming anarchy in the name of Allah, and the cops just hang back. Way to shame Islam and your nation, you bunch of hypocritical hooligans.
Malaysia Boleh! How about we try for true religious equality here, with no superiority bullshit? Boleh tak?

News and such...

2009-08-30T17:10:00.004-05:00

First up. I suffered a minor electrical burn on my left index finger last month. It happened on July 15th, 2009, the day Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince came out. I remember this because I had gone out for the midnight showing the night before. Anyway... burn is healed now, except for the ugly scar.

Then... a week after that, my right back door got smushed by one of the UT trucks. One of the maintenance guys forgot to out the truck in park, got out and started talking to someone as the truck plowed into the side of my car. Damage cost about $1200 to fix, and I'm awaiting the check from UT. Door has been fixed, so UT pretty much owes me a LOT of money.

Onto happier news, Jacob and I are kinda unofficially engaged. Jacob made me a little CD, and on the insert, Track 9 had "Will you marry me?" written next to it. The answer was yes... so I guess we're engaged. No rings. No plans for a wedding and all that jazz. I think it was August 13th, but it could've been the 14th. Here's Track 9, if you're curious:

The song is "The Fall" by Peter and the Wolf.

Georges Jeanty's 3rd Buffy Sketchbook

2009-08-30T17:02:00.001-05:00

Received an e-mail last week from Jeanty announcing the upcoming release of his 3rd Buffy sketchbook. Release date is September 4th, 2009, and the books can be purchased either from Jeanty's website, or picked up at DragonCon this year. Volume 3 will collect the "Wolves at the Gate" arc, and presumably also collect "A Beautiful Sunset". For those not in the know, these books are filled with sketches, thumbnails, conceptual drawings, and the like. But more interestingly, they contain Jeanty's commentary about his work and process, which offers a rather nice "behind-the-scenes" look at things.
They go for $20 a pop, and price is inclusive of an original head sketch by Jeanty.

New hair

2009-08-25T08:35:00.003-05:00

New camera and vacation time...

2009-08-11T14:27:00.002-05:00

Bought a new camera on Sunday. Click to be directed to the Target site.
It's a Canon Powershot, and seemed nifty enough without breaking the bank. My old Olympus has been majorly screwing up... the photos it takes are still of very good quality, but the problem lies in taking them; the damn piece of equipment is about as temperamental as my mother! Also, the flash is broken, go figure.

In other news... I'm taking my first official vacation since I've started working. Time off starts officially tomorrow, and I'll be off until the 23rd of August. 10 glorious days away from work! Jacob's coming back tomorrow, so I'll be picking him up from the airport, and we'll be staying at a hotel until Friday. Then it's back to Port A for the weekend, and back to Austin again on Monday to help him and his room-mate move into their new place. His room-mate is leaving for Nebraska after that, and I think we'll be staying at his new place until I leave that weekend.
Also, going to watch Wicked this Thursday! Excited!
If you have no idea what this is all about, click to be directed to the Wiki site.

Buffy Season 8 #27

2009-08-05T16:25:00.006-05:00

Part 2 of Jane Espenson's "Retreat" arc... pretty much what most second books in each arc is like: exposition. Nothing much really happens, beyond exposition and some build-up for the later parts of the arc, as well as the season. A few character moments here and there, but they're quiet small ones, not like the jeans of a Hannah Montana pre-teen with a Bedazzler.

Art: Fundamentally, this issue is all exposition, and this is true, even right down to the art. There are few close-ups of character faces, and those close-ups are usually of the secondary characters. Oz gets the most mug time, and Jeanty's pencils are pretty hit-or-miss here. There are panels where he nails the Oz-isms, but then you'll get the faraway shots that look like Andrew's been subbed in. Perhaps it's good that Oz and Andrew don't share face-time in this issue; the latter gets written off as the "womanly man" who's being made comfortable. Back to the point at hand: Most panels are busy, the curse of a large ensemble cast. There's just no way to detail everyone's faces to the liking of some fans, and Jeanty does his best by playing with perspective; characters closer get more detail than the ones set farther back. One note: Bay does bear a striking resemblance to Dichen Lachman... most panels of her are less detailed, but the one close-up of her smiling while narrating how she introduced Oz to the Bon religion is spot on.

Landscapes are amazing, and the detail is quite astounding. Madsen's colors add life to every page, reserving a warmer more vibrant palette for the Tibetan scenes, a sepia-tinged wash for the flashbacks, as well as a colder color scheme for the villains. Why she succeeds so well is because the colors don't fight for dominance with the pencils, but rather enhance them. Instead of aiming for photo-realism with the colors, Madsen's style meshes very well with Jeanty's more cartoony style, and results in what I find to be a more harmonious union.

Writing: The pace has slowed down some from the last issue, but Espenson keeps us moving along without too much slack. My only criticism of the writing is the placement of the scene where the guy points out the "spike". It's a single page, and it just broke the pace of Oz's exposition, since right after it, Oz continues. IMO, the scene in question should have been allowed to continue from the opening sequence, without losing any momentum. Since the scene ends with Twilight commanding the guy to "Pinpoint the location", opening the next scene with the location tag is still appropriate.

Other than that, Espenson's script delivers the funny without sacrificing plot. The introduction of Oz's baby was hilarious. Side note: The dog is extremely cute! Also, she manages to translate Oz's usually more taciturn character to page not so much by limiting his words (well, he's telling the story...) but by having Oz tell the story the way Oz would. Laid-back and unfazed, even when Giles is constantly pushing him to get to the point. And speaking of Oz, the Oz/Willow exchange was nicely handled, despite the space constraints, and the dialogue is about as Oz/Willow-ish as can be.

Couple of other things to note.
1. Twilight again references how well he knows Buffy.
2. While this is mere speculation, Riley seemed to play down the "spike". Trying to protect Buffy and Co. or genuine skepticism? Hmm...
3. Twilight's motives are actually called into question by "spike" guy when he says "I don't like this. If we're against magic, it seems so wrong..." in response to Amy's bone-casting-magic-locating spell.
4. Speaking of "magic", anyone else notice the inconsistency of the spelling of the damn word? It's spelled "magic" in the little blurb on the inside of the front cover too.
5. Willow is apparently powerful enough to mask a HUGE spell with another spell... just as Buffy predicted in the previous issue.

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince movie review

2009-07-19T10:46:00.002-05:00

Sorry about the delay... been pretty under the weather all week now. Going to the midnight showing probably didn't do my body any favors, considering that we got home probably about 3:30am and I was up again by 7am. But it was totally worth it.

Plot: Pretty similar to the book. Dumbledore recruits Harry into retrieving an important memory of Lord Voldemort from the newly hired Potions Master, Prof. Slughorn. The memory in question of course is the one regarding the creation of Horcruxes, a plot point that will become a major player in the next book. Throw in a dash of Quidditch, some romance, death-traps, near death encounters, and you have it all. The perfect metaphor for growing up. Not really, we should all be so lucky.

Thoughts: David Yates may very well have been the best director to happen upon the franchise. His darker stylistic approach to Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix carries over here, and it's definitely well-suited to the darker tone of the series in its later years. In terms of the screenplay, once again, the film succeeds as an adaptation because it's a presentation of the boiled-down plot; at its core is a coherent story, and although book fanatics will no doubt bemoan the excisions made, it should be noted that nuances of many of these cuts remain in small references. As always, some nuance is lost, but that's the game of book adaptations anyway. The ending, I thought, was a little stronger than in the book, with the scene just focusing on the core three, with Ron pretty much just sitting quietly. No funeral scene, but it's unnecessary, given the beautiful foreshadowing of the great Battle of Hogwarts in the film. Having the students and the teachers obliterate the Dark Mark with their lit wands was a great symbolic moment.

With the excision of Bill and Fleur's engagement, and the burning of the Burrow, it may be pretty clear that the wedding sequence may very well be done for in the next film. As it is, the Weasley clan may pretty much be boiled down to Ron, Ginny, the twins, Molly, and Arthur. I heard that an actor has already been cast as Bill, so maybe he'll have a minor role in the next couple of films. Also... no house elves in this one, which means that Dobby's appearance in either the next film, or the one after that (for the uninitiated, Book 7 will be filmed in two parts) will be the first we've seen of him since HP and the Chamber of Secrets.

Some negatives though. The whole "Half-Blood Prince" reveal was pretty weak, considering that it's the title of the book and the movie. There's no lead up to it, and it's merely left to waste with Snape finally just confessing before storming off into the dark. Some of the sexual innuendos were quite unnecessary. They added to the comedy, but at times felt out of place.

All in all, pretty good movie. I'll give it a B++ (almost an A-).

... Harry Potter on opening night...

2009-07-07T22:57:00.002-05:00

Bought ticket today. It'll be awesome. Midnight showing on the 15th... the ticket says "Late-Tuesday/Early-Wednesday".
I think I'm gonna dress up as a house elf. Time to go look for some awesome tube socks.

Happy 4th Anniversary Boy!

2009-07-05T19:23:00.002-05:00

Yesterday (July 4th) marked our 4th anniversary. In keeping with tradition, we didn't celebrate together... I think we've only ever celebrated one anniversary together thus far.
Loving you.

Buffy Season 8 #26

2009-07-01T20:19:00.004-05:00

Holy cow! After 6 months of low urgency, despite the intended purpose of the "Predators and Prey" arc, the adrenaline rush from just reading this issue has me all tingly still. It's 22-pages of non-stop chaos, illustrating exactly how bad things are, not just in terms of the attacks, but also the counter-attack schemes stacked up upon each other.

Writing: I was a little nervous at first, after reading "Harmonic Divergence". That clearly wasn't Jane Espenson's strongest work. This, however, had renewed my faith in her abilities. The voices are spot on, and the pacing of the story is pitch-perfect, allowing the characters to come through the madness. The only point of confusion would be how the real Warren knew what lies the First had been stuffing into Andrew's ears in the Season 6-7 interim. Unless, killing Jonathan to make themselves gods was something that Warren had talked about with Andrew in Season 6. Jonathan was the little black sheep of the Trio, so to make him the sacrificial lamb for their selfish schemes wouldn't be way over the top to believe. But otherwise, minor plot hole of sorts... The two pages of Buffy and Giles having a conversation about Willow and the events of "Time of Your Life" are amazingly reminiscent of their little chat in "Grave". The Buffy/Giles reconciliation is about as organic as the way they dealt with their animosity at the end of S7. Buffy's tearful hug when she sees Giles speaks louder than any number of pages of chit-chat can. She's missed him, and despite their fallout in "NFFY", he is important to her. Also, she probably now understands why he tried to keep her out of the whole Gigi affair, having dealt with Simone herself. Dealing with rogue Slayers, not the best feeling in the world, seeing as Buffy knows that she's the reason they have power in the first place. It's an organic enough transition, and the gravity of the season thus far finally sets in when Buffy again addresses the issue of where the Slayers stand in the cosmic balance, but this time, she's a little more on the nose when she asks Giles if the Slayers are really the bad guys. In other words, Twilight's plan is working marvelously as he has planted the seed of self-doubt in her, and now has her on the run. My guess is at the end of this arc, like many penultimate eps (or around there) so far, Buffy regains her faith (hmmm... metaphor?) in herself and goes back to being the Buffy in the closing panels of "TLWH".

Art: For the most part, rather glorious. The subtleties in so many of the panels is what makes Jeanty the perfect candidate to be carrying the bulk of Season 8, just like the tons of little references, and in-jokes in the TV show. There are no wasted panels at all. Even something as mundane as a panel with Willow and Kennedy snuggled in bed contains an interesting detail: look at the book on the nightstand. It's Wicked. I don't think the reference is lost on anyone there. I will admit, I'm a huge Lord of the Rings fan, and the sequence of the invading army coming over the bridge just reminded me of the departing orc army as they leave Minas Morgul in The Return of the King. Another instance of unwasted panel space is the Wiccan girl who dies from a "brain-fry". In the panel where one of the Wicca girls yells "Second shield down!", you can see the other girl's face contorted in concentration, trying to keep the last shield up. Then you have the napalm explosion, and you see her dead, apparently from trying too hard. It's subtle details like this that make the art truly alive for me. Oh, and Georges... totally caught your own little bit of shameless self-promotion! If you've no idea what I'm talking about, check out Faith's shirt when she interrupts Buffy's chat with Giles. The hippo is Jeanty's logo/mascot.

It's been a while since I've commented on the letters and colors, but I'll just say that it's all very impressive work this month. The letters convey everything clearly, without being ostentatious, and the color scheme goes so well with the different moods. Madsen's mood lighting in the catacombs is perhaps only outdone in her consistently awesome colors in the battle sequences. She may not have the subtle command of light of Fabio Mantovani, but given Jeanty's slightly more cartoony style, her vibrant colors mesh well with the pencils.

All in all, big thumbs up.

Buffy vs. Edward (Cullen)

2009-06-23T18:40:00.002-05:00

Enjoy... it's really well done.

You may only call me "Mrs. Darcy"... when you are completely, and perfectly, and incandescently happy.

2009-06-15T23:23:00.002-05:00

Yep... watched Pride and Prejudice (the 2005 film version with Keira Knightley) twice today! Oxygen Channel back-to-back extravaganza! And it was fabulous. Costumes. Check. Keira. Check. Really hot Mr. Darcy (sorry Colin Firth-philes... I liked this version better... he's prettier and that whole tormented puppy thing is so his forte). Check.
Swoon... color me "incandescently" satisfied.

Up Movie Review

2009-06-14T22:31:00.002-05:00

Watched this Friday night in 3D... absolutely fantastic movie! Pixar has truly outdone themselves this time around. The first five minutes were truly the best that I've seen in any movie in quite a while, rivaling the exposition sequences of both The Fellowship of the Ring and Watchmen. It's the perfect balance of quirk, sweetness, and sorrow all in one.

Plot: Introverted guy meets his soulmate in the form of a free-spirited tomboy through their mutual love for adventure. They vow to go to Paradise Falls in South America, but never make it as she dies of age-related complications. Guy becomes a bitter old man, who after an unfortunate outburst is forced to go to a retirement home. Instead of complying, he decided to fly his house over to Paradise Falls, fulfilling a promise that he never got to keep. Things go slightly awry when a Wilderness Explorer (basically a boyscout) named Russel tags along. Together, they embark on a wonderfully fulfilling journey and adventure that will change them both.

Thoughts: The animation is truly remarkable. While the characters look rather cartoony, the amount of detail in just about everything is astounding. You see the fibers in close-ups of Wilderness Explorer patches, the reflection of a television set in the old man's glasses, and even more fantastic yet, the diffused light shining through the cloud of balloons is probably the most wonderful imitation of real-life detail I've ever seen in an animated feature.

The voice acting was fantastic, with all the actors embodying their characters very convincingly. The story and lines are wonderfully written, and everything strikes this perfect balance of comedy and adventure. Kids will love it, and I can vouch for post-college students.

Rating: A

Milk vs. The Wrestler

2009-06-08T22:29:00.002-05:00

Yeah, double movie review in one. The reason I'm doing this is because both Mickey Rourke and Sean Penn were the top contenders in the Best Actor category at the 81st Annual Academy Awards this year, with Sean Penn gaining somewhat of an upset win, since Rourke had consistently kicked his ass all over awards season. But Penn's victory was kinda expected, given the Academy's fondness of biopics.

Anyway, onto the merits. Both films couldn't be further apart in terms of production values. Both Milk and The Wrestler are finely acted films, with a stellar cast, but whereas Milk always looked polished, and very beautifully edited, The Wrestler was definitely more real and gritty. However, I found The Wrestler to be the more emotionally honest of the two. It had no pretensions of grandeur: The basic premise is of a washed-up wrestler and his (lack of) relevance to the world. He lives in a trailer. He's alone. His daughter hates him. A heart attack nearly does him in. He still owns a Nintendo. The film isn't pretty. It's ugly, but it's so painfully honest and real that you actually feel for the characters, despite their less-than-finer moments.

Don't get me wrong, I thoroughly enjoyed Milk too. Sean Penn was superb in it, and the entire supporting cast rounded up the entire project. It's a film with a lot to say, and the message is loud and clear: Have hope. It's especially relevant in times when same-sex marriages are being denied, and people's fundamental rights are being denied on grounds of it being a moral issue instead of a human rights one. I watched it and felt the entire roller-coaster ride.

All in all, both great movies and highly deserving of the critical acclaim and accolades that decorate the DVD boxes.

Ratings:
The Wrestler - A
Milk - A-

Port A Beach Fun!

2009-06-08T11:35:00.002-05:00

Click on any of the pics to be directed to the album, if you want.

Well, they saved a ton in the costume dept...

2009-06-04T09:16:00.001-05:00

Reead "Baby", 3 mecs à China Town, avec NuitSexy.fr
by rollrecords

Buffy Season 8 Tales of the Vampires: The Thrill

2009-06-03T19:45:00.008-05:00

First break of the year from the Season 8 story, but instead of taking a jaunt far away from it, this issue offers a complementary view of the world in the Bufyverse post-"Harmonic Divergence". Written by Becky Cloonan, it introduces the protagonist, Jacob ("Jay"), and the world he lives in (i.e. bored teen living in rural-ish suburban small New England town hell). What it does is it finally shows us two things that were quite sorely missed in the "Predators and Prey" arc of S8; how the general public are reacting towards vampires, as well as how Slayers are now social pariahs. Thoughts will follow in the appropriate section.

Art: It's not the best looking art out there, but strangely enough, I found it quite charming. It fits in quite well with the quirky stable of varying art styles of the previous Tales of the Vampires. However, allow me one MAJOR gripe. In the variant cover by Gabriel Ba and Fabio Moon, the three vampires that beat Jacob up are shown to be reflected in the screen of the video game! Did someone miss the memo about how vampires in the Buffyverse don't reflect? They don't sparkle either, just FYI.
Anyway, moving on. Found the dream sequences to be quite brilliantly rendered. The shot of Alex's butt made me think of that "I Like Big Butts" song.

Loved the deliberate usage of red whenever Jay feeds. Stylistically, it just works.

Thoughts: While in general, this issue does explain why vampires are accepted (as long as they don't kill), there's nothing new there. We already knew this from "Harmonic Divergence". All the issue really does is ram home the point about the "symbiotic" relationship, though one could probably make a case for parasitism too. However, what I found unsatisfying is how it doesn't explore grounds other than the extreme; at least in this bored little town, everyone seems to be down with the vampires, whereas Slayers are considered to be outcasts. Even Jay's mom hardly reacts to her son joining the legions of the undead. Note the metaphor in the scene where she's slicing a pomegranate. Other than the fact that it's all red and juicy, it does bring to mind the Greek myth of Persephone and Hades, where Hades tricks Persephone into consuming pomegranate seeds in order to keep her as his queen of the Underworld. Because she doesn't consume them all, she spends part of the year with her mother, Demeter, the goddess of grain and fertility, during which the Earth is fertile (basically the explanation for seasonal change). It's an interesting metaphor for the themes of death and rebirth that are so intrinsic to so much vampire lore.

Another point to make I guess is the difference between the general population and Alex. While people are bored and getting their kicks by getting sucked on, thus indicating an appreciation for the supernatural, Alex echoes Buffy's old lamentation about never wanting to be a Slayer, and merely wanting a "normal life". Girl however gets screwed over twice here: first, when she didn't get a choice about being called as a Slayer, and secondly, when it's hinted that she would be sired anyway, even against her will, as Jay notes that it "isn't about her choice. It's about [his] choice".
I did like that we didn't get the portrayal of vampires as fuzzy cuddlies. In fact, Jay at one point considers killing his mother so that he could have the house to himself and May. It's a stark reminder that the Jay we see after being sired is merely a shell containing a ravening demon.

All in all, enjoyable read. Definitely a worthy addition to the Tales of the Vampires anthology.

The "moral" definitions of marriage...

2009-06-03T11:20:00.001-05:00

'Nuff said.

Bored...

2009-06-01T15:57:00.003-05:00

Pretty much procrastinating and not working right now. Knew I shouldn't have been industrious yesterday and come in to finish off stuff... now I'm just completely unmotivated to do anything else for the day.
So... it's June. Paid my rent today. Will pay my credit card right after this, and pay my car payment too. It's amazing how fast my paycheck tends to go at the start of each month.
So... turned 24 last week... still waiting for some kinda epiphany of sorts to kick in. I heard that it's called "growing up". Maybe I'll be a perpetual child... I still eat like one anyway.
If you're wondering why I'm blogging about being bored, it's simply to keep me away from Sephora.com, Amazon.com, or eBay. Don't have the money to be throwing around...
Think I'll just amuse myself with a long walk with Pi later... I'm turning a warm shade of bronze from all these walks. As for Pi... the puppy is well. Well, as well as can be with an ear infection. Silly girl pretty much eats up a significant chunk of my paycheck each month. Last month, it was a vet visit for severe diarrhea and the ear infection. That costs pretty much about $200 combined. Taking her in again on Friday so that they can check on her ear again... note to pet owners: Ear drops and dogs... not so good.
On to other news... she tried making friends with a snake this morning. Yes, my heart did kinda stop for a moment, and I yanked her far away from the disgusting reptile... she was about 4-5 feet away, but that was plenty close enough for me. Snakes... yech!
Why couldn't she have tried snuggling a bunny or something?

Star Trek Movie Review

2009-05-24T22:47:00.002-05:00

First of, let me just say that this movie actually lived up to the hype surrounding it. I'm no Trekkie, and it took me a while to actually get that the Scottish guy was Scottie, as in "Beam me up, Scottie". Yeah, sad. But it made the reveal that much cooler for me. But, even going in blind, I came out thoroughly entertained, and with my hope in American summer cinema renewed.

Plot: Basically an origin story of the crew of the Enterprise, focusing primarily on the characters of Kirk and Spock. Throw in a little bit of time-travel mumbo-jumbo, some kinda cool special effects, plenty of referential humor, and you've pretty much got the gist of it.

Thoughts: Let's start with visuals. Surprisingly, for a movie that relies so heavily on SFX, the visuals are rather understated and not at all ostentatious. Also really liked the play between the ordinary and the crazy; i.e. the shot where Kirk rides a motorcycle into the scene, and the ship dock looms in the horizon. Also liked that they have kept the outfits looking rather retro and classic-looking, with a few subtle modifications to show that that costume department wasn't gypped. The Vulcan learning center is way cool though... school would've been so much more awesome if that's how we learned!

Acting... ensemble piece, so no real standout performances. That said, Zachary Quinto was actually really good as the young Spock. There's a fine line between playing stoic and wooden (Hayden Christensen should take notes on how to improve his portrayal of Anakin Skywalker), and Quinto seemed to take it in strides. As I said earlier, not a Trekkie, so I'm not real clear as to how William Shatner used to play Kirk, but if Kirk was supposed to be a rather brash, arrogant asshole (with his heart in the right place), then I think Chris Pine did a decent job. His handsome mug took quite a beating though... there's barely 10 minutes of the movie where his face doesn't look like a bruised eggplant. Everyone else was sufficient, given their limited screentime. No idea where the Spock/Uhura romance came from, but other than that gripe, the film's pretty much solid throughout.

Overall: A-

Terminator Salvation Movie Review

2009-05-24T22:23:00.006-05:00

Watched it Friday night, and while I didn't think it was an utter waste of time (i.e. T3), I wasn't blown away. IMO, the trailer editing was better than the movie itself. The plot while decent, was so paint-by-the-numbers that as an audience, you knew exactly what was going to happen the moment you were given the usual cliched cue point. Where Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles succeeds over Terminator Salvation is where the focus is on the characters, and not the shiny gizmos. But more on that in later rambles.

Plot: Basically a reversal of roles in that John Connor now has to save Kyle Reese, his father, in order to ensure his own preservation, more or less. It's still human vs. machine, but the Terminators are a helluva lot less menacing when they're ordered in bulk. What made the first 3 movies more thrilling was the sense of mano y mano. Here, not so much. There's a subplot involving Marcus, a death row inmate who signs his body over to research, only to find himself resurrected 15 years later, but the catch is he's no longer human, or at least not entirely. His character is peppered with Biblical allusions, and at least twice, the Christ imagery is so blatant that even the most obtuse viewer has to see it. Come to think of it, just Wikipedia the damn thing

Thoughts: It's post-JD... the world is supposed to be a burnt cinder... plenty of room for human drama... especially since this was supposed to be the first in a new movie trilogy, you'd think that some development on the John Connor front would be mandatory. He is now considered a prophet of sorts, and is also a war-trained soldier. But you get more soldier than the prophet part. Which kinda blows, because that's an interesting angle to explore, given that we're never really told why John Connor is such a BFD in the first place. My answer to my boyfriend (who asked the question) was: "Well, they probably made him that important when they decided to send Terminators back in time to kill him"). He's not the leader of the Resistance here. He's merely a soldier, but also one that holds much clout because of his messiah status.

Funny thing is, despite having top-billing in the movie, Bale really isn't the focus of the plot. It's mostly about Marcus, who in several scenes actually has JC-imagery bestowed upon him, making him an interesting foil for Bale's Connor. However, the full potential is never reached, due to the very basic script. Kate Connor was pretty much a complete waste of space and character potential. All she did was stand around, say a few lines... zzzzzzzz.

The backdrop/landscape... I think there lies my biggest problem. As Jacob pointed out: "Where the hell is the nuclear fallout? It's a few years after a nuclear apocalypse... and nothing?" Which is true. It mostly looks like they ripped off imagery from Resident Evil: Apocalypse and wait for it... Blade Runner. I kid you not. Anyone who's seen Blade Runner will probably moan at the first sight of SkyNet. They may as well have included a full disclosure about just cleaning up the Blade Runner footage and using it here.

The ending... pretty damn lousy actually. Barely makes any biological sense at all, unless, by total complete coincidence, Marcus is a perfect match for John. But of course John couldn't die then, for who else would've sent Kyle back into the past to make sure that Sarah Connor was protected, and himself conceived.

All in all: C+

Happy Birthday Boy!

2009-05-24T19:05:00.002-05:00

Boy turned 22 today!

Moving...

2009-05-09T11:27:00.002-05:00

The past week or so has been spent actively packing and making small trips (well, my car is small...) leisurely to my new place. After depositing all my books/media stuff, I thought I'd made a considerable dent. Wrong.
Brad and Rebecca helped move the large items yesterday in their trucks (saved a considerable amount from not having to get a UHaul). I made another trip back at night to get some more crap.
It's Saturday (went to bed at ~1am, was woken up by a wet lick at 6.47am) morning, and I've been at my old place for a few hours now, just cleaning and picking stuff up. The car is full... I'll still need another trip, which is fine, considering I don't wanna vacuum today. Well, that and I probably can't, considering I've not really eaten since Thursday afternoon.
But I'm almost there! One more day... But I still need to get professional cleaners to come and clean the carpet (management's mandate, not voluntary)...
FUCK!

Buffy Season 8 #25

2009-05-06T17:09:00.002-05:00

Okay... where to start? Hmmm... how about how much I loved this issue? Yeah, that's as good a place as any. This, and #22 have been the only two issues of the entire "Predators and Prey" arc that I've really liked. #21 was okay too, but the clunky start kinda robbed it.

Art: I guess there was a silver lining after all, in last month's hiatus from overall quality. The Richards' stinky art was coupled with Krueger's stinky writing. But it gave Jeanty time to do this, deliver art worthy to be compared to "WatG" again. The pencils are definitely some of the strongest I've seen in a while. And personally, I think Jeanty may have done his best SMG likeness to date in the panel right after Xander tells her Dawn's dirty li'l secret.

Inks and colors were good. Especially the colors. After last month's debacle... Madsen also returns to grace with this issue. The colors are nice and crisp, without any of that nasty green she used on the tentacled monster in #24.

Couple of little things I noted. One, Leah's shirt apparent gets shorter in the span of a few panels. The first panel we see her in (page 5), her sleeveless checked shirt reveals a teensy bit of midriff. The next page, you see that the shirt is now longer in the 2nd panel (and solid green), and by the third panel, it's checked again, but now, it's been Britney-fied! :) And then after the fight with the six vampires... Leah changes clothes into a lime green polo.I just thought it was funny that it's always Leah who gets the instant clothes/weapon change. See the battle royal in #15 for Leah's magical ability to switch weapons very quickly.

Writing: Doug Petrie returns the series to grace with some great writing. The wit, the wordplay, the pop-culture references (like real pop-culture references, not generic ones like that used in #24... I really am hating on #24). All there. And even better, some great lines between Dawn and Buffy. Xander gets some good ones too, but they're not as poignant, as it should be.

I find it hilarious that the "army" we were expecting consisted of six vampires, who were probably kinda drunk if they thought that it was a good idea to storm the Slayer fortress. Wonder if there were more of them (hence, "army") but the rest just came to their senses faster. That said, whoever has been feeding Slayer Org. intel really needs to cross-reference before sounding the alarm. I mean, Willy the Snitch was a wee bit more reliable than this. Six vampires... pfft!

Really liked how this issue wrapped up the Buffy/Dawn abandonment issues too, by giving us Buffy's side for why she's been ignoring Dawn's predicament. I'm glad to have Dawn back to normal. The thing with Kenny was actually quite sweet (he calls her "Dawnie" too), and I'm glad that they finally got to have that talk that should have come instead of the magical smiting. Or was that "magickal"? Seems that all Dawn had to do was apologize for what she did to free herself of her magical freakshow. Nifty.

One little aside: Wonder how Lorelahn and the rest of the forest peeps are gonna take the death of their buddy? I mean, did Buffy really break the truce? And then hurl the munchkin and kill him/it? The panel that shows him lying in a heap post-toss shows "X"s for eyes... usually a comic notation for dead. But how cool is it that Buffy actually speaks whatever crazy language the forest people do? Or at least understands it.

Now... two months before #26. But hey, "Tales of the Vampires" one-shot as a fill-in. Could be good...

17 Again Movie Review

2009-05-02T23:08:00.003-05:00

Saturday night. PG-13 movie. High school kids. Yep... I felt completely out of place. Or maybe I hoped I seemed out of place... as in I no longer look like a high schooler. I personally feel like a hag, but that's just me. Though... I did avoid getting carded last weekend for a bottle of wine... so maybe, just maybe, I look at least 21. Anyway, Kat and I braved the masses of swooning Efronites. Sadly, I think we were sucked into the whole conversion scheme. More on that in a bit.

Plot: High school jock knocks up high school sweetheart, and gives up a promising basketball career to be with her. Flash-forward 20 years later, he's been kicked out of his own house, his wife is filing for divorce (because he constantly blamed her for the rut he's in), his kids don't really want anything to do with him, he's passed over for a promotion in favor of some twit, and he's crashing at his best friend's place. Best friend incidentally is your generic nerd/geek who has made his millions creating the software that prevents music piracy (and by happy coincidence, also the software that made piracy possible in the first place). Anyway, he meets his "spirit guide" in the form of an old man posing as the high school janitor, and becomes 17 again. He decides that this is his new chance at life, re-enrolls in high school. Hijinks of the typical kind ensue, until he understands what his second chance is really for: not at life, but with his family.

Thoughts: Gotta say that I was kinda impressed by Zac Efron here. Not only did he carry the movie through, he was actually pretty likable. It's not the meatiest role in the world (think a transition point out of the High School Musical era), but he fills it up. And yes, although on principle, I'm supposed to not find Efron attractive, it's kinda hard to not be won over by him. Hence the conversion moment. Th guy does look good in skinny jeans.
The rest of the cast did their job. Only thing that puzzles me is how the daughter goes from "nun" to raging nympho in the course of 15 minutes.

Overall, it was a fun romp. There were some good moments, mostly predictable ones, and some righteously hilarious ones. Bottom line, I enjoyed it.

Rating: B

Odd preview...

2009-04-27T20:53:00.007-05:00

... for Buffy Season 8 #25. Not quite sure what to make of it yet, but it's mildly disturbing. I'm really hoping that this will close the gestalt arc with the bang much needed... but I'm just glad that Jeanty is back on pencils this time around!

EDIT: 3 additional pages added. Still disturbing, but not as amorphous as before.

Joss Whedon's Bradbury Award Acceptance Speech (recorded)

2009-04-26T09:14:00.001-05:00

Goodbye "Ahn-sun" Ah Kong

2009-04-23T22:41:00.004-05:00

Not a good year for my grandparents. First, my paternal grandmother passes away, now my maternal grandfather. As was tradition, he was named "Ahn-sun" Ah Kong based on geographic location. "Ahn-sun" being the bastardization of Anson, since my mother grew up in Teluk Anson (translation: Port Anson... I think...). Teluk Anson is now known as Teluk Intan... ya know, as an attempt to forget our colonial past.

Anyway... RIP grandpa.

More wonderful YouTube music goodness

2009-04-18T16:29:00.002-05:00

Random YouTube goodies

2009-04-17T19:56:00.002-05:00

Found some really cool stuff on YouTube. Yes, it's an utter waste of time, but necessary.
First up, two girls doing this ridiculous interpretation of Daft Punk's "Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger".

Next, we have two boys doing the same thing... which hey, not that original, but at least they're easy on the eyes.

Next... a mime doing his interpretation of Natalie Imbruglia's "Torn". Thanks Hakan!

Random sappy homo...

2009-04-17T19:46:00.000-05:00

Joss Whedon on Humanism

2009-04-14T18:49:00.001-05:00

Joss Whedon receives the Outstanding Lifetime Achievement Award in Cultural Humanism at Harvard University's Memorial Church. 10 April 2009

Makes me happy...

2009-04-12T22:30:00.002-05:00

Dedicated to a special boy...

Buffy Season 8 #24

2009-04-01T18:23:00.005-05:00

Dear lord, what a bloody let down. Let me just start by saying that this went completely against any expectation that I may have had. I'll be the first to say that I usually wouldn't hold that against anything... unless it was pretty awful. That said, let's jump into it shall we?

Plot: Faith and Giles accompany new Slayer, Courtney, across Germany to pay a visit to a mysterious place dubbed the "Slayer Sanctuary". There they discover that the sanctuary is actually a sacrificial ground for unwilling Slayers. Yes... it's quite nonsensical

Art: Meh. Actually, more along the lines of meh-gack! It started out meh, then went towards gack. The one area that Cliff Richards always seems to earn praise is in his likenesses. Personally, I've never cared too much for his likenesses (they were serviceable, but with no charisma), and unfortunately for this issue, the same gripe surfaces. His Faith and Giles are serviceable at best... they bear a remote resemblance to the actors. But capturing a character goes so much deeper than just capturing the bone structure and proportions of a character. To truly capture a likeness, the character has to "act" like the real thing. The quirks, the charms, the mannerisms, the posture. Richards' characters don't act. They stand about and fake it.

Nevermind that... his landscapes fake it too. What's with all the flying scraps of paper?! Seriously. Go count how many panels feature scraps of paper billowing in the wind. The Germany I remember was insanely clean! Or at least I didn't see scraps of paper everywhere. Onwards anyway... usage of space... not one of Richards' strong points either. His panels fail to evoke any sense of space... they're always so claustrophobic with everything just kinda crammed in there. There are no details, and large rooms are always featureless. An example would be the town library. Instead of showcasing the cavernous space, the lofted skylit ceiling, we get rows and rows of identically sized books. Even the shelves are boring. The floor hopelessly drab. And in many of the panels... nothing at all. Much like his cavernous space in #10 where Buffy and Willow meet the Andy Warhol demon. It all boils down to a lack of creativity. Or at least a failure to translate. It's like the first Tomb Raider game when you look up at the ceiling and see just black, instead of the ceiling or the sky.

And finally... hydra-hair. Enough said.

Writing: I was hoping that #21 ("Harmonic Divergence") would be the low point of the arc, or even the entire season. Too bad, I'm sad. Where this fails is where it makes its leading lady feel like a recurring guest star instead of taking us deeper into what makes Faith tick. Even though Faith is featured prominently in the issue, she really doesn't say or do much that means anything. That makes it an utter waste of space for me. An even greater waste is the complete non-existence of character chemistry between Faith and Giles as partners. In fact, the partnership seems to have disintegrated, with Giles being all stuffy and commanding, and Faith reduced to pouting and mouthing off.

The tone is somewhat reminiscent of "Gingerbread", complete with the German demons. The plot is kinda nonsensical, but not much more than "Gingerbread", and some of the wackier episodes of seasons past. The premise behind a Slayer Sanctuary is intriguing, and the twist is kinda wicked, but it just doesn't pay off. There's just a complete disconnect between Faith and the events that transpire. She's just not there. That's a great fault of the writing. Where is the connection between the Faith who's regretful (and quite a bit guilty, judging from the words spoken by the manifestation of her fear) about letting one of her first vampires go, the Faith that then kills the demon, and the Faith at the end?

Verdict: Quite utterly fail!

Homos love Buffy Season 8

2009-03-29T17:22:00.002-05:00

Buffy Season 8 won in the "Outstanding Comic Book" category today at the 20th Annual GLAAD Media Awards. That's pretty awesome news. Congratulations Joss and Co. on your win, and please continue your sensitive and realistic portrayals of the LGBT community.

Click here to be directed to the press release.

The return of Faith (Yay!)... and Cliff Richards (UGH!)

2009-03-28T12:01:00.005-05:00

I'm bored, so I thought I might as well post a preview of the coming issue of Buffy Season 8. #24 drops on April 1st, no it's not an April Fool's joke.

In the fourth installment of the gestalt arc, the attention switches back to Faith and Giles. Preview pages were released by Dark Horse on Wednesday, followed by Comics Continuum a couple of days after. Only two pages, but it's enough for me to be reminded of my dislike of Cliff Richards' work. It's hard to explain why I dislike the man's work that much, but I'll try. Too many lines on faces. Apparently he's a genius at capturing likenesses, but I don't see it. His likenesses are adequate enough, but there's something wooden about his illustrations; i.e. no life. But perhaps my biggest peeve is how much his work reminds me of the earlier Buffy comics which quite frankly, more often than not sucked ostrich eggs. Click on the thumbnails for larger images.

Spring Break came and went. UGH!

2009-03-23T22:15:00.005-05:00

Break is over. First day back at work was close to excruciating. Waking up on time was a nuisance, and knowing that I had to be in by a certain time made me just want to call in sick and sleep in, even though I'm not much of a sleeper-inner. At any rate, a wet nose to the eye and a fluffy tail to the face would have got me up by 8 AM at the latest. Pets... count on them to ruin any plans of blissful laziness.

Anyway... Spring Break was uneventful. Jacob was down for the week, and we just loitered. Made an Indian and Irish soup (separate recipes) from The Ultimate Soup Bible with varying degrees of success. The problem with trying recipes randomly is that you have no idea what the damn thing is supposed to taste like, and so you just roll with it and add a shitload of salt and pepper to taste, and try to convince yourself that it tastes the way it's supposed to, and the adverse reaction you had to the initial taste was just your uncultured tastebuds planning the next Revolution. Both soups turned out pretty good though. Incidentally, there was a riot in France (again!) this past week, causing Peter to miss his connecting flight from London to the US, leaving me with the perfect opening to take Friday off. Yes... despite it being Spring Break, I was at work Monday through Thursday. However, it did kinda pay off, since all the data I needed to generate for the grant proposal finally got done, hence the justification for randomly taking a day off.

But back to the thought at hand for a wee moment... my spice rack is now looking mighty impressive. The sheer amount of herbs/spices purchased just to make these ridiculously intricate soup recipes is astounding. Which is why dessert is so much easier to make. I tried my hand at a Mississippi Mud Pie from scratch, which I will report was a raging success. All the way to the hand-whipped whipped cream (no spray can bullshit here). I may be a baker yet!

Right now... I'm listening to "Sweet Dream" by Greg Laswell, a song purchased on iTunes for $0.99, for the 5th time of the night... very short tune (1:08) but amazingly poignant and touching. Damn Joss Whedon and his mastery of the five minute final montage! YouTube video with the song is embedded:

Lyrics below:

If I could write out my own dream
For the next time that I sleep
You'd be the first one that I see
And I the last one that you keep
The dream would go on and on
While we sway
Against all things thrown our way
And the morning would be so cruel
When it came
With sunshine and warmth to bring
For announcing the end of my sweet dream
For announcing the end of my sweet dream

Also... happily being lulled into a happy place by my new home improvement investment: a scented oil reed diffuser. The scent is "Lotus Bamboo" or something kinda ponce-y like that. But it smells divine. Can you tell that I'm in one of my strange post-colonial moods, where I write in a bastardized amalgam of English from all over the place?

If you can't... well, I am.

The boy left yesterday morning. Bad day. As always, stayed in a strange funk for most of the day. It always takes a day to shake off the funk. This usually results in unchecked retail therapy, hence the damn reed diffuser. But it's put me in a better mood now that my apartment smells positively zen-like, minus the unnecessary electric usage. Also noteworthy of my current state of mind, I'm currently in my "save the Earth, reduce my carbon footprint" funk. Which results in me wasting money on stuff like vegetable-based surfactant cleaning products.

Is it also apparent that I'm just in a weird mood? Leona Lewis does that to me... her rendition of Snow Patrol's "Run" is currently spinning. Next on my list of songs to find/buy: Lady GaGa's "Poker Face". Oh, I'm such a bloody queer.

Yeah, definitely in a weird post-colonial funk. UGH!

Watchmen movie review

2009-03-15T17:26:00.002-05:00

Finally went to see this today. Jacob's mostly through the source material, but given the unpredictability of my work week (despite it being Spring Break and all), I wanted to see it this weekend.

Plot: Either read the graphic novel, or look it up on Wikipedia. I'd suggest you do yourself a great favor, and actually read the graphic novel. For literary snobs who may deem funny books inferior to pretentious prose, it may be worthy to note that Watchmen has the distinction of being ranked as one the the "100 Greatest Novels" by Time magazine. So save the snobbery for something that actually deserves your uncultured scorn.

Random musings: This isn't an easy review to write. For one, the graphic novel kinda defies categorization, melding a whodunnit thriller with socio-political commentary. First things first: the tone of the graphic novel penned by Alan Moore and drawn by Dave Gibbons in the 1980s is pretty fully realized here. Director Zack Snyder's take on Watchmen is actually pretty faithful to the original material, making it a period piece set in 1985. In this reality, Nixon is still the President of the United States (elected into his third term), and the United States is at the cusp of nuclear war with the Soviet Union.

For the sake of the uninformed, this is NOT your typical superhero movie. In fact, you may take it to be the antithesis of superhero films. Yes, the main characters do hop around and fight crime in ridiculous costumes, but Moore's masterpiece turns the convention on its head and tells a tale of human triumphs and failures. FYI, the failures outweigh the triumphs. By a massive margin. Of the entire ensemble, it may be worthy to note that only one (Dr. Manhattan) is clearly superhuman, and one more (Adrian Veidt/Ozymandias) borders on the upper limit of human abilities.

There are some pretty good reasons that the movie has an R-rating, so leave the kiddies at home. I have no idea what some parents are thinking, but there were several kids in the movie theater. And when I say kids, I mean in the age range of 7-12 years of age. Yeah... inappropriate.

A thing to note is how no one is happy with just spandex anymore for superhero outfits. Everyone's moved on to more structural materials, and Watchmen isn't any different. All the outfits (with the exception of Rorschach's) have received a make-over, favoring heavy latex with molded muscles. For the lone female character, Silk Spectre, her more flowy yellow tunic has been made more form-fitting, accented with some heavy-duty thigh-high stiletto boots. Remarkably, every cast member does bear a rather uncanny resemblance to their comic book counterpart.

For a story that has been deemed "unfilmable" (it remained in production limbo for over two decades), Snyder has pulled off quite a remarkable feat. The 6-minute opening montage set to Bob Dylan's "The Times They Are A-Changin'" is perhaps one of the best usages of a prologue sequence I've ever seen. Much like the extended sequence in The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring, it manages to cram plenty of backstory into an efficiently cut scene. However, I will note that people who have read the book will perhaps benefit more because it's kinda like an inside joke. The same can be said for the movie in general, but that's not to say that one cannot enjoy it without having previous knowledge if the books.

Onto other news... yes, Doctor Manhattan does walk around in the buff, and yes, like in the graphic novel, the character's digitally-created penis (the entire character is CG) does flash (pun intended) across the scene more than a few times. In fact, it's less of a flash than it is a slow amble across a park. So slowly does Doctor Manhattan move that it pretty much just sways languidly in his most strenuous movements. I have heard complaints of "too much penis!", and I roll my eyes. I applaud Snyder for having the audacity to actually bring the source material to life, and having the commitment to recreating scenes without compromising. It's a damn CGI penis. It's an R-rated movie. Despite Puritanic claims of "too much penis", most of the viewers have either seen one, or have one. So really... grow the fuck up! And I don't mean the penis... it's already rather large.

In further defense of yet another explicit scene: the mile-high club scene. First-hand, I've heard the scene called "gratuitous" and "ridiculous" and described as "too long". On a reactionary level, I may be inclined to agree, since the scene is replete with rhythmic thrusts, indications of orgasms, and a fiery climax (no pun or exaggeration here), all set to Leonard Cohen's "Hallelujah". On a more analytical viewing, one should probably also realize that the moment is a personal triumph (just about the only triumphant moment in the entire film) for both characters. Dan Dreiberg/Nite Owl II feels "impotent", "afraid", and hides his true self "in plain sight". Laurie Juspeczyk/Silk Spectre II never wanted to become a crime fighter, but did it to please her mother. Her long-term relationship with Dr. Manhattan went south because she stopped feeling connected to him at all, since the good doc has his head in other areas. The scene is a moment of celebration between the two; Dan for finally allowing himself to relish being a caped crusader again, and Laurie for actually enjoying her return to her crime-fighting days, as well as being able to connect again. Having said all that, it would be exploitative to truncate the scene; it's a scene that should either be taken out entirely, or allowed to progress in its entirety. Quite frankly, I'm glad they kept it in as it's utterly necessary.

Now, where I thought the movie veered into gratuitous territory was with the violence. Yes, the source was no stranger to violence, but there were a couple of scenes with just a tad too much stylized violence for me to justify. Two that come to mind specifically are the alley fight and the scene where a guy's arms are sawed off so that he wouldn't be in the way when a couple of thugs sawed their way into Rorschach's cell. Sticking more faithfully to the text would probably have had the same impact, as neither skimp on the violence, but with much less gore.

Performances... pretty solid across the board, but a few stick out. Patrick Wilson as Nite Owl II and Jackie Earle Haley as Rorschach are superb, both embodying their characters with real sincerity. Acting through a mask is an intense exercise, and Haley's performance is aided by Rorschach's ever changing mask, which is almost a character onto itself. Billy Crudup's Doctor Manhattan is lot sadder than I remembered the character being, but given the tone of the movie, it is fitting, and I'm glad they went in that direction instead of giving him a more "God-like" timbre to his voice. Jeffrey Dean Morgan (Denny Duquette to Grey's Anatomy fans) takes a surprising turn as an extremely sympathetic Comedian, making it hard to hate the sociopathic bastard his character is. Rounding out the main cast are Malin Åkerman as Silk Spectre II and Matthew Goode as Ozymandias. I wasn't really sure about Åkerman at first, but she did grow on me after a bit.

Preventing this adaptation from being merely a visual rehash, this adaptation is also a topical commentary, injecting a subplot about a new source of energy, independent of fossil fuel. This plotpoint legitimizes the change made in the ending of the story. Instead of having a giant squid creature go Godzilla on NYC, the fruition of Ozymandias' plan now involves blowing up major cities across the world and blaming it on Doctor Manhattan.

Overall: A-

Buffy Season 8 #23

2009-03-04T23:23:00.004-06:00

The skinny: #23... gotta say, not as blown away by it as I had hoped to be. A big part of it is because it kinda suffers from middle-child syndrome. The writing isn't terribly imaginative, nor is it awful. It's just... average. And right now, I'm just really wanting to get to the climax of this pseudo-arc of sorts. And usually, we should be there by now... except for the whole "5-issue arc" deal. Pfft.

Art: Jeanty's work is on par with his previous good work here, no major gripes of any sort. But definitely not of the caliber of "A Beautiful Sunset". That one's hard to top. However, I will note that this issue was pretty heavy on the faraway less distinct style he has with characters. The detail isn't any more lacking than usual, and it works in the medium. I will however note that his landscapes are pretty detailed and well-thought out. He deftly captures the mood of the trashed Italian village, and his little touches like the graffiti are quite inspired. Little thing to note though... a mild inconsistency in the early scene in the control room. Xander is shown to be standing behind Buffy in two panels, and in the next, he's behind Willow. While one could argue that he merely moved, upon closer inspection, Buffy and Willow have switched positions too, swapping sides. It's not a big deal, but it is a minor inconsistency. All is forgiven for his well-executed action sequences though, particularly in the fight between Simone and Buffy. The sense of motion is clean and clear in its intent, and it's quite a joy to watch Buffy in fluid action. My two favorite series of panels are the ones of Buffy swinging on the chandelier, and the two wide panels of Buffy and Simone at a stalemate. The former for its depiction of fluid action, and the latter because of Jeanty's impressive command of camera angles - using the panels to "pan up/down". It's also throwaway symbolism for Buffy having the upper hand, and Simone not being afraid to fight dirty and almost literally hitting below the belt.

Writing: Drew Z. Greenberg does an adequate job of giving Andrew some great moments, but some of Andrew's lines miss the mark and sound rather forced. The nerd babble was hilarious, and the wide breadth of geek trivia that Andrew includes in his ramblings was fitting, but phrases like "Whaaaat uuuuuup!" just veer off-course. He does share some good moments with Buffy, and the dynamic between the two is not as I expected (i.e. geek bonding, Buffy's patience). In fact, their relationship culminates into a rather nicely written climax where Simone offers Buffy the option of walking away with the Ragna demon in exchange for Andrew. Turns out, Simone isn't very fond of her ex-Watcher and wants to hurt him. Buffy refuses on account of not walking away from "[her] people" because it's not "who [she] is".

The Andrew development is actually quite well done. While it may seem that his "I'm just one. The needs of the many outweigh the needs--" speech may seem to recall the old Andrew of "Storyteller", where everything is a canned speech from some piece of pop-culture, his actions at the end speak for themselves: he is truly sorry for the damage that he has done, and wants to make amends. He's not just putting in the hours of compiling data of the Ragna demon because it's his job, he's doing it because he feels sorry. Buffy acknowledgement that Andrew is now part of "the family" pretty much made his day, from the expression on his face in the final panel.

Finally, something that has been picked up on quite often, it seems. While superficially, Buffy abandonment of Simone and her Slayers after freeing the Ragna demon may echo the scene where Angel does nothing to stop Darla and Drusilla from massacring a roomful of Wolfram and Hart associates, I didn't read it as such. For one, it's quite explicit that Simone wants to hurt Andrew. I doubt she would have just let Buffy, Andrew, the Italian squad, as well as the civilians just walk away without some kind of fight. There is nothing to suggest that Simone was backing down; she was outnumbered, but not beaten. The only safe way to ensure a relatively safe retreat was to employ a diversion. Ragna demon = big diversion. Seventeen Slayers (Simone's sixteen plus herself) should be more than able to take on one Shelob-lite. While some girls may get hurt, it's a case of better them than us principle. Simone and Co. have defected from Slayer Inc. In short, they're no longer Buffy's "people". It's been shown time and again that Buffy puts her people over the fate of the others (i.e. trading the box of demon spiders for Willow, at the risk of allowing the Mayor's Ascension, leaving Ben alive when Dawn needed her more). It may not be her only MO, but it is one of them.

All in all, quite entertaining. Definitely better than #21.

Q&A with Georges Jeanty over at SlayAlive Session 2

2009-03-04T22:41:00.003-06:00

Anyone interested, click here to be redirected to the appropriate thread. If you want to participate, but are wary about joining online fandoms, e-mail me at wenxina@slayalive.com.

I'll be happy to add your questions to the queue. We'd like fans to take advantage of these great opportunities to communicate with the people who work hard to bring the finished product into our hands.

The aim is to do one of these on the release date of every new issue, so keep your eyes peeled for more.

Q&A with Georges Jeanty over at SlayAlive

2009-03-01T09:05:00.005-06:00

Hey all.

Thought I'd just shamelessly plug a Q&A I worked hard on getting with Buffy Season 8 artist, Georges Jeanty. FYI, the man is terribly gracious, and very personable, which still caught me off-guard, despite my hearing previous claims that he was very much so. I guess I'm a little jaded when it comes to famous peeps. Anyway, look for this to become a monthly, or at least semi-regular event over at SlayAlive! Just another way we're trying to expand the fanbase knowledge by bringing fans closer to the creators of the works they (and we) love.

Anyway, this is Session 1 with Georges. Session 2 will commence at the release of Buffy Season 8 #23 (March 4th 2009), so if anyone reading this is interested, look out for the link in a future post. Anyone interested in Georges' website, and possibly buying some of his sketchbooks, check out the Kaba Lounge. A complimentary headsketch is included with each of his sketchbooks, and you get to specify which character you'd like. Check out the sketch I requested a while ago.

Taking the night off...

2009-02-18T23:16:00.003-06:00

I've decided that I'm not doing any data analysis tonight! I've taken work home with me these last few days, and it's taken its toll on my sanity.

I will probably regret this tomorrow morning when Peter starts calling my cellphone demanding data, but there's only so much a person can do on a tight deadline, and so I'm claiming tonight a work-free night!

Look what I won...

2009-02-17T23:51:00.001-06:00

Got this little trinket from the annual SlayAlive Awards...

This is hilarious...

2009-02-17T21:33:00.004-06:00

Being the narcissist that I can be at times, I Googled my own name to see what popped up. Amongst other things is this quote by me on the Marquette Office of International Education website:

"I chose Marquette because of its reputation as one of the best universities in the US as well its intensive curriculum. But more important, I chose Marquette because I was made to feel welcome, long before I even set foot on campus."

- Wenxian Tan, Class of 2007

EDIT: Things get stranger. The same quote is being used to represent Marquette on the US Education Guides page. Yay! I'm a spokesperson. Who woulda thunk?

Buffy Season 8 #22

2009-02-04T18:36:00.006-06:00

This issue has definitely rekindled my extremely high expectations (and usually, high opinion) of the series. While #21 left me a little cold (except for the thought exercise), this issue took off right from "Monster. Big &*&@ing monster".

Let's work our way from the superficial to the deeper, shall we? (careful... I'm beginning to sound like Andrew... must be the anticipation for #23).

Georges' art is bloody fantastic. His facial expressions convey the emotions without becoming too camp, which can't be said for many people. The guy's a great penciller with a cinematographer's eye, switching from close-ups to panoramic shots with such fluidity that it tells a story in itself. One minor gripe though... he always draws the same action poses. That bent leg kick that Kennedy delivers to Satsu's gut... it's the same one that Soledad used on Harmony, and unless I'm mistaken, it's the same kick used by the random Slayer on Gigi in #6. Or that caught-in-midair-in-a-somersault move that all the Slayers apparently do (check previous issues). It's not that big a deal, but I've got a photographic memory for certain details, and so the repeats get... repetitive (*sigh* not at my wittiest today). But minor... moving on. Oh, and a great plus-side... Kennedy's suspenders, a nod to her more quirky sense of style in S7. DeKnight's writing hits true and fast. What struck me about this issue is that even though it's only part of a larger picture, it does feel like it had a true beginning, middle, and end, and it all meshed together really well without feeling rushed and truncated. The writing... there's a degree of macabre humor here that was only hinted at in "Smile Time" over at AtS. And even then, there was less gore involved (the puppets were stuffed, not full of oozing organs), and the degree of organization was less... organized. I mean, talk about an issue loaded with humor that a biologist can appreciate. First, the giant Vampy Cat creature is composed of millions of Vampy Cats, just like a multicellular organism is composed of millions/billions of cells. The fact that the Vampy Cats are telepathic is even more suggestive of a neural network.

On to deeper thoughts. A friend and I were having a discussion a while back, about the significance of the closing sequence of "The Long Way Home", where Buffy accuses General Voll of not liking that a whole bunch of women now have power. Said friend argued that it was just a residual feminist kick from having dealt with the misogynistic preacher from S7, and stated that Voll quickly corrects her that it's not just men Buffy's standing against now, it's the whole of mankind. Which I conceded to be quite right, except that it would seem odd that given the precious commodity of word space, that something like Buffy's words wouldn't have been chosen with utmost care. In this issue, I think it's pretty clear that the issue partially lies in the fact that the Slayer organization is almost entirely female. First, there's Satsu's conservative garb in her brainwashed stupor, claiming that "girls should kiss boys and have their babies![...] instead of running around hitting people all the time[...] We should be ashamed of ourselves". All this while "impregnated" with the Vampy Cat (see another "Swell" connotation here?). Then, there's the bit about "We're nothing but a bunch of self-righteous little ovaries", which eerily echoes Voll's first comments about Buffy's new army. And then... "Eat their #%&@ing ovaries!"

There is almost no subtext here... these are misogynistic values being spattered all over like guts. Whether the rest of humanity is aware or not, Twilight is no champion of equality, like I've heard some people argue. He wants the scales tipped, the previous status quo returned, but remember, this is a pre-"Chosen" ideal, before girls came into power. His words to Buffy in #11 are quite clearly misogynistic, where he taunts her crying to be "just like a girl". The man is aligned with Warren, who's probably the second largest misogynistic prick in the Buffyverse (1st is Caleb), and now, had planned on unleashing an army of demonic Hello Kitty knockoffs that have a taste for ovaries. I think I've made my case here.

Identity seems to be a big theme here. First, with Satsu's reveal that her being gay "destroyed" her parents. But more importantly, there's the bit about what a Slayer is. We keep coming back to this question, the word on the street now is that Slayers are toy-destroying psychos. They are feared, they are hated, and Buffy wants to retreat underground. She claims that they have to "stop being whatever we've been and focus. Be more than human." The same church bell has gone off about how Buffy's not seeing the error of her ways, and that she should be thinking about integrating herself (and the Slayer army) with humanity. But the point is, Slayers are different, and they are more than human. Not in the elitist sense, but that they have a destiny and duty that others don't. They are charged with being the force to beat back evil. Elitist would have been Gigi's plan, to become a master race and beat down humanity. Slayers are the uber-mensch but with great power comes great responsibility (okay, totally going Andrew here). The Slayer organization has in no way seen themselves as superior to mankind. They still hold the view that they are the good guys, the Chosen few (what's a couple thousand in the exploding human population?), the warrior of the people.

Parting comments: I liked that Harmony was referenced, since she did start the ball running. First Anderson Cooper, now Larry King; the ditz sure is burning up the talk show circuit, hitting the A-listers of talk. Who's next? Oprah? Please not Tyra! Though it would be fitting... the next ANTM will feature vampires. What better way to stay thin than to be on a liquid diet?

Satsu's growth as a character (to me) feels like the emotional core of the story. I'm beginning to feel that Kennedy will never get leading-lady status. She's great as a supporting actress, and probably too good. She's the catalyst in the story, and although she gets a few great lines, she's exactly where she stood at the start of S8. She drops in, she moves things along, but she's never really developed. Kinda like Faith, in S7 of Buffy.

Can't wait for #23 now... Buffy and Andrew together, when they're supposed to be going low profile. Yeah, that'll be interesting.