Down Time

I know, between prepping to move to Westlock and the stresses of starting a new job, I really shouldn't be going off on flights of fancy, but I'm fond of quoting my mother:  "Sometimes, you just have to treat yourself."  I'm also fond of quoting Captain Kirk:  "The greater the intelligence, the greater the need for the simplicity of play."

And that's how I'm justifying going into Edmonton yesterday.

I still had some money left on a Christmas gift card, and I had it earmarked for getting Skyfall on Blu-Ray.  The latest James Bond movie, and, in my opinion, the best of the Daniel Craig ones to date.  Had to get that for my collection.

Plus, also, more James Bond movies!  As I've already blogged, I'm not in much of a rush to upgrade my DVDs to Blu-Ray, because I don't have a HDTV yet to fully enjoy them.  But I don't know if you've noticed, but the James Bond Blu-Rays are dirt cheap right now.  So while they are priced so low, I've been upgrading them while I can.  Back in the fall, I got The Spy Who Loved Me, because, damn it, my DVD just won't play any more, and On Her Majesty's Secret Service, the lone George Lazenby Bond film, because it was the toughest one for me to find on DVD, so I figured I should snap up the Blu-Ray while I could.  A couple of months ago, I upgraded Tomorrow Never Dies and The Living Daylights, so the last of mine to upgrade was Goldfinger.  And there it was, in HMV's 2 for $20 section.  But, what other one to get for $20?  I decided to go with my second favourite of the Roger Moore Bonds, Moonraker.  So, I guess, rather than just my favourites, I'm now getting my second-favourites as well. 

Well, I haven't upgraded everything yet.  I still have to get Casino Royale on Blu-Ray, but darn it, most places still want full price for that one.  But I see, to tie-in with Skyfall, it's just been released in a nice little 2-pack with Quantum of Solace, so that just might be worth getting.  

but yeah...that was pretty much it.  Not a very eventful city trip.  Got in, got my movies, got out. 

But I did get some work done on the moving-front.  Before I left for the city, raided Athabasca's grocery stores to get more boxes.  And it gave me time to watch some Saturday morning cartoons.  Justice League Unlimited is now on in re-runs, and it's still a great adaptation of the DC Universe.  This one featured a character I wished they explored a little more, Galatea. 

The mytharc of Justice League Unlimited concerned Project Cadmus, a secret government agency tasked with creating super-weapons should the Justice League ever fall to the dark side and this army of superheroes try to take over the world.  Their chief assassin and super-soldier:  Galatea, an evil clone of Supergirl.  Whereas Supergirl is always a teenager of 16 or so, Galatea was artificially aged to her physical prime...age 30, I believe they said in her first appearance.  However, a fluke in cloning process has given her an empathic link with Supergirl, which resulted in the side effect of Galatea being cursed with a conscience. 

This particular episode happens when things with Cadmus and the JLA come to a head, and Galatea is dispatched to lead an assault on the Watchtower...the Justice League's space station headquarters.  Professor Emil Hamilton, the scientist who created her, is doing all that super-soldier monitoring stuff, making sure she's ready for battle, outfitting her with her latest gear...it's all very business like, with Hamilton having an air of detachment about it all.  He's just doing his job.  When the job is done, when Galatea gets up to leave, she pauses at the door for a moment, turns around, and comes back to Hamilton and gives him a great big hug...like how any soldier would say good-bye to their loved ones before going off to war.  She whispers in his ear, "Good-bye, Dad," and then heads off to slay the Justice League.

And the lock of surprise and horror on Hamilton's face, as he realizes that this living weapon he's created has come to regard him as its father, is priceless.  Their relationship  is definitely something worth exploring.  But sadly, that was Galatea's second and final appearance in the show.  Hopefully, the comic writers will pick it up some day. 

Fishing in the Discount Bin - King Kong (1933)

Welcome back to Fishing in the Discount Bin, my weekly look at one of the many, many DVDs in my home video library.  Today, we get to the genesis of all giant monster films, the grandfather of the special-effects driven blockbuster, the original King Kong.  This entry is originally dated July 13, 2012.

Batman: The Dark Knight Returns Part II Review

Well, I think it's time to take a break from packing and panicking about the move to kick back, relax, and finally take in the latest DC Comics/Warner Brothers direct-to-DVD animated movie.  Let's take a look at....

Batman: The Dark Knight Returns Part II

Directed by Jay Olivia

Starring the voices of Peter Weller, Ariel Winter, David Selby, Michael Emerson, Mark Valley, Michael McKeen, Robin Atkin Downes, Tress MacNeille, and Conan O'Brien

Backstory:  Again, for the most part, I've been enjoying this series of direct-to-DVD movies, but it seemed like craziness to try to adapt The Dark Knight Returns.  With such a seminal graphic novel, you can't help but fear they'd get it wrong.  But, at least they had the good sense to split it up into two movies to make sure it would be done right and not rushed.  Part I came out back in the fall, and quickly became a critical darling, sweeping much love online.  Me?  I merely thought it was good, not great.  But I had hope for Part II.  Because of how they split it up, I knew Part II was when we'd be getting to all the good stuff from the graphic novel.  So does Part II bring us a satisfactory conclusion?

Plot:  When last we left the Caped Crusader, it was the dystopian 1980s.  Batman, now in his 50s, comes out of retirement, takes down a viscious street gang known as the Mutants, and gets back to work cleaning up the streets.  During Batman's years of inactivity, the Joker has been existing in a catatonic state in Arkham Asylum.  But with Batman's return, the Joker snaps back to life and begins plotting the mother of all comebacks.  But in this era, most superheroes have given up their secret identities and gone into hiding, save for one Man of Steel who sold out and became a government agent.  With Batman keeping law and order in Gotham City, the government is starting to look foolish in the public eye.  The stage is set for two climactic showdowns:  Batman's final battle with Joker, followed by Batman resisting arrest at the hands of Superman.

What I Liked:  This movie is very faithful to the original graphic novel.  And there's a few nice embellishments as well.  Of course, since they did away with Batman's internal monologue, the dialogue then conveys most of the information, and Batman and Joker's banter during their final battle is amazing.  The action sequences are also pretty good, with Batman and Superman's final fight being much more brutal than what they did in the comics.

What I Didn't Like:  Naturally, this movie had to be very compressed when compared to the comics, so a few things had to get cut out.  Certain scenes and certain side plots are reduced to throwaway lines, which is a little disappointing,

Final Verdict:  Probably as best an adaptation of The Dark Knight Returns that we'll ever get.  But still, the book is better.

3 Nibs

Bonus Materials:  For bonus features on the Blu-Ray, you get a featurette on the times that Batman has fought Superman in the comics, a featurette on the Joker, a featurette on adapting the legendary graphic novel, 3 bonus episodes of Batman cartoons, and a preview for the next film Superman Unbound, coming out this summer.

Fishing in the Discount Bin - John Carter

Welcome back to Fishing in the Discount Bin, my weekly look at one of the many movies in my home video library.  I already remarked that, thanks to how the schedule is working, I seem to be doing movies that came out a year ago.  And, it was almost a year ago that the new record-setter for biggest bomb of all time came out, John Carter.  This entry is originally dated June 24, 2012.

The Super Bowl Movie Spots

It's been a few days, and I haven't had a chance to sit and blog about the Super Bowl movie spots.  Not much really caught my eye this year.  According to the news the day after, the most watched one was the one for Oz: The Great and Powerful.  And I'm still scratching my head that they made a sixth Fast and the Furious movie.  But there were a couple that did catch my eye.

One that grabbed my attention, our latest look at the new Star Trek movie, Into Darkness.


We didn't get to see much new in this spot, but I am still interested.  With Benidict Cumberbatch's line, "I'm better than you...at everything," I'm starting to get more convinced that the villain is Khan...or some genetically engineered super soldier.

And yes, I do have the much-ballyhooed app, and I've already scanned it and seen the 2-second longer version.

The other one that caught my eye was for Disney's The Lone Ranger.  At 90 seconds, it was the longest movie spot at the Super Bowl...almost the right length for another trailer.


It's looking good...but still very different from The Lone Ranger that I grew up with.  I still fear that they pumped it full of supernatural BS.  The last time they did that with a perfectly good Western hero was Jonah Hex, and look how that turned out.

It just might be a good summer at the movies.

From Up on Poppy Hill Trailer

I've been waiting for a glimpse of this film.  Coming to theatres in North America later this spring, the latest from the legendary Japanese studio Studio Ghibli, From Up on Poppy Hill.

From Up on Poppy Hill originally hit theatres in Japan in the summer of 2011, and served as a reconciliation between father and son.  The screenplay was written by Studio Ghibli's genius emeritus, Hayao Miyazaki.  And the film was directed by his son Goro Miyazaki.  Goro had long been reluctant to get into the family business, having had a successful career as a landscape architecht.  He made his directorial debut with the 2006 Ghibli film Tales from Earthsea.  He originally joined the project as a consultant...then got promoted to a storyboard artist...and finally getting promoted to director.  The elder Miyazaki was apparently furious with the decision.  As Hayao said in an interview at the time, there used to be a rigid system in Japanese animation where you'd cut your teeth on TV shows before graduating to animated films, but a new generation raised with the Disney films of the 1990s wanted to leap straight into feature animation.  He felt his son just hadn't paid his dues.  But, Tales from Earthsea hit theatres, and Hayao Miyazaki felt it was pretty good, and father and son reconciled.  Hayao admitted that the main character in his 2008 film Ponyo was based on Goro at age 5, and they finally officially worked together on From Up on Poppy Hill.

By the way, if you've never heard of Tales from Earthsea, I don't blame you.  While the elder Miyazaki liked it, most critics didn't.  It's kind of regarded as the Cars of the Studio Ghibli catalog...it's not very good, but it gets a pass because it was made by studio know for high quality.  When Disney dubbed it and released it in theatres, it didn't get a wide release, only playing it a few film festivals in 2010, and then they quietly released it on DVD in 2011.

And speaking of Disney, From Up on Poppy Hill is notable in that it's the first Studio Ghibli film since the late 1990s that's NOT being dubbed and released by the Walt Disney Studios.  It's being released by a company called GKIDS.  GKIDS originally started as the organizing body of the New York International Children's Film Festival.  In 2008, they expanded into theatrical distribution, bringing to North American theatres such Oscar-nominated animated films as The Secret of Kells, Chico & Rita, and A Cat in Paris.  In 2011, they scored a major coup when they acquired the theatrical distribution rights to the entire Studio Ghibli catalog.  I think Disney still owns the home video rights.

That being said, though, there's a lot of Disney personnel still involved in the dubbing process.  The dub was produced by legendary producers Frank Marshall and Kathleen "the new boss of Luscafilm" Kennedy, who produced the dubs of Ponyo and The Secret World of Arrietty.  The English dub was once again directed by legendary Pixar sound designer Gary Rydstrom, who directed the English dubs of Tales from Earthsea and The Secret World of Arrietty.  And, following the Disney tradition, the dub has an all-star voice cast, including Once Upon a Time star Sarah Bolger, Anton Yelchin, Gillian Anderson, Jamie Lee Curtis, Christina Hendricks, Chris "Mr. Big" Noth, Beau Bridges, Aubrey Plaza, and Ron Howard.

So, given all that, what is the film about?  Set in early 1960s Japan, it's the tender coming-of-age tale of a teen girl named Umi, who has a daily routine of raising signal flags in her front yard which overlooks a nearby harbor.  These flags soon catch the attention of a boy named Shun, and they engage in the typical teenage romance.  And they soon band together to help renovate and fix up the building that houses their high school's clubs.  And Umi tries to come to terms with her father, who died during the Korean War when she was very young.  

It did play a few Oscar-qualifying runs at film festivals in the fall, and many thought that, with the Ghibli name, it would have been a lock for a Best Animated Film Oscar, but it wasn't.  It starts hitting theatres in North America this March.  But, let's be honest, GKIDS doesn't have quite the reach of Disney, so if you want to see it in theaters, keep an eye on your local movie listings for when it hits your local art house.

Upon Leaving Athabasca

I've been thinking for the past few days that I'd like to sit down and share a few thoughts upon leaving Athabasca, but the more that life gets in the way, I find the desire to do it is starting to leave me, so I figured I should do it while the shred of desire is left.

People keep asking me if I'm excited that I'm leaving, or starting the new gig, and the truth is...no.  That's no slam against Athabasca, or Westlock, or the Company, it's just the way I am.  When I went to Japan all those years ago, I wasn't excited until I was pulling up to the airport.  When I cam home from Japan, I wasn't excited about going home until the plane touched down at Edmonton International.  When I started working in Athabasca, I wasn't excited until my second day at work.  It was on the second day when I felt truly on my own and that it was all on me.

So, no.  I'm not excited yet.  There's still too much to do.  I still haven't found a place in Westlock, and once that's done, there's the packing and the moving.  Excitement will find its moment.

I wish I did sit down to write this, though, before I did my final show back on Friday.  When things were done and I was reviewing the audio, I was a little embarrassed.  If I sat down to write this and had collected my thoughts a little more, before going on the air, I wouldn't have sounded so raw.  It would have been polished a little more.  But there are nuggets of truth in there.

As I said, because small town radio stations have notoriously high turnover, there's a large segment of the listening population that thinks I've only been here six months or so.  But I was here just shy of 7 years.  April 2006 - February 2013 is how it'll read on my resume.  And the little old radio station went through quite a few changes in those years.  I started when we were on AM and a country music station, then we flipped to classic hits and changed our name, then we flipped to FM and changed our name again.  In a performance review, I was asked what I felt my greatest contribution to the station was.  I said consistency.

But as I said on the air on Friday, one thing that has constantly amazed me about Athabasca and the listening area is the ability of the community to band together and achieve the impossible.  I know the go-to example in recent years has been how Athabasca opened their homes to the Slave Lake evacuees during the Slave Lake fires, but I was thinking before that.  I was thinking about how the Athabasca Regional Multiplex came to be.  When I first started here 7 years ago, the Multiplex was still an empty lot and a dream.  Yeah, the town and the county chipped in some money, there were a few provincial grants as well, but the lion's share was raised by the people because they needed that facility.  The field house isn't named after the Rotary Club through some name-rights deal...it's because the Rotary Club single-handedly raised $2 million for the building.  When the Edmonton Oilers had their kids training camp here a couple years ago and I was emceeing the opening ceremony, I said that minor hockey built the Multiplex, and I stand by that.  The Multiplex started when the Athabasca Minor Hockey Association approached the municipalities and said, "We need a new rink."  Minor hockey did the vast majority of the fundraising.  The Multiplex was built by the people.  The grand opening of the Multiplex in the spring of 2008 was the last big event I got to cover before being promoted from news to on-air.

Lots of people don't remember that, either.  I started here as the news reporter, and spent two years doing that before I became the wacky morning guy.  I paid my dues spending late nights covering town council meetings, followed by early mornings writing it up for the 6AM news.  A town concillor stopped me the grocery store the other day and asked if I'd ever spend late nights covering town council meetings.  Apparently, he'd forgotten that I was the reporter at all those town council meetings back when he was the mayor.  I missed covering council meetings when I left the news department.  They go from high drama to deep lunacy...they're delightfully entertaining.

One thing I'll miss the most about Athabasca is Athabasca University.  I love that place.  I'm a big fan of post secondary education - that's why I've done it so many times - and for this world class facility to be in a small Alberta town is just amazing.  Every year, when Convocation rolls around, and people from all over the world come to Athabasca to have their moment on the stage and accept their hard-earned degree, I just can't help but cheer.  It's a signature Athabasca event that really deserves more attention.  Even when I was no longer a reporter and wasn't obligated to be there anymore, I'd still take a moment to head up there and take it in.  And it was practical, too, as I'd often be hanging around the Financial Aid office trying to find help in finally getting my student loans paid off.

As I packed up the various mementos around my office, I took a moment to remember.  I had a hockey puck from the Battle of the Border...a fundraiser held for the Multiplex.  The Canadian Women's Olympic hockey team took on the American Women's Olympic hockey team in an exhibition game.  I've got another hockey puck from the Oilers, and that aforementioned training camp for kids they held here a couple years ago.  I took down my Canadian flag, which had hung in my dorm room all throughout my college years, and when the 2010 Winter Olympics came along, I hung it in my office to cheer on Team Canada, and just kind of left it up.  I remember when the MLA came down one day to record some commercials.  He looked at that Canadian flag, rolled his eyes, let out a sigh of disgust, and said, "You really should have an Alberta flag up."  I threw out my trophy from when I represented the station at the Winter Festival of Speed in Lac la Biche a few years ago.  I came in third, and the person who placed first - the announcer from the Bonnyville station - decided to play a rather mean-spirited prank on me.  I'm still sore about it.

Athabasca really has been the culmination of a life's goal.  When I was 10 years old, I saw the movie Good Morning Vietnam and decided that being a radio announcer was what I wanted to do when I grew up.  When I went to college, first thing I did was volunteer for the college station.  After college, I thought the whole radio system would be out of my system and I could become a grown up.  But it wasn't.  So I went back to college, got my degree in broadcasting, and started in Athabasca.  And now, I'm getting ready to head off to a new town, new station, and do it all over again.  The dream goes on.  The adventure continues.

I think excitement is finding its moment.

Fishing in the Discount Bin - Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows

Time for Fishing in the Discount Bin, my weekly gaze at something in my home video library because I really don't have much of a social life.  This time out, we're doing the second in Robert Downey Jr's take on the world's greatest detective, Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows.  This entry is originally dated June 24, 2012.

The Targ New Year's Special: 35% More!

Man, o man, I just can't seem to find the time to do this anymore.  But I've got stories to tell, and I like being on the radio, so why not bust out a podcast?  Time for a new episode of U62: The Targ!

I've already talked on the various social media about how awesome Star Wars Identities was.  But, that's not the only thing I did at the Telus World of Science.  I also took in an IMAX documentary and saw my first ever planetarium show.  And, I also tell some tales of my Christmas vacation, such as finally getting my holy grail of Star Wars action figures, and sampling some very tasty treats I got for Christmas.

So check out my New Years Special:  35% More


Click here to go download it!


Head here to subscribe in iTunes!


Be a fan in Facebook! 

Fishing in the Discount Bin: The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring -- Extended Edition

Welcome to this week's edition of Fishing in the Discount Bin, where I go through my DVDs, watch one, and blog about it.  This week, we start on Peter Jackson's extended editions of his epic trilogy, The Lord of the Rings.  Yup, it's the Fellowship of the Ring.  This entry is originally dated June 17, 2012.

Star Wars Identities Link Collection

So, if you're my friend on Facebook or if you follow me on Twitter, you know that, back on Thursday, I went to see Star Wars: Identities at the Telus World of Science.  And I loved it!  So I just thought I'd take a minute to collect all the links I've been posting to the social networks.

Now, Star Wars Identities is more than just a wide collection of props from the Star Wars films on display.  The educational component is they explore everything that goes into creating our identity:  our upbringing, the influences of friends and mentors, life events that come along and change things...stuff like that.  And they use the story arcs of Luke Skywalker from the original trilogy and Anakin Skywalker from the prequels as their prime examples.  The interactive component is you wear this special wristband, and along the way, you have to make certain life choices.  And at the end, you get to see the Star Wars character you created.

This is me.  This is me in Star Wars.  This is the character I created.

 

To read my character's bio, just click this link! 

But that's not all.  I also had my camera along and took lots of pictures.  I took lots of video, too, and edited it together into a little home movie.  So, here it is, my little film, entitled Mark Goes to Star Wars Identities.




This video is lovingly dedicated to my friend Kenten, because only he would give me the idea of doing a Red Green/Star Wars mash-up.

I do have a gigantic, epic length blog entry planned talking about my impressions and reflections on, not just Star Wars Identities, but my first trip to the Telus World of Science in about 15 years or so.  Hopefully that'll be up in the next day or so...getting it finished is top of my to-do list for this Sunday. 

Fishing in the Discount Bin: Superman -- The Animated Series

Welcome back to another edition of Fishing in the Discount Bin, my weekly look at one of the many, many, many movies in my home video library.  Today, it's my recent attempt to tackle a TV series.  It's the classic 1990s cartoon Superman: The Animated Series.  This is originally dated in my notes as June 10, 2012.

Scarecrow's Oscar Picks: 2013 Edition

Well, it's that time of  year!  The Oscar nominations were announced a few years ago, so it's time to do what I've been doing since I started blogging in the late-1990s.  It's time for me to do my Oscar picks!

Now, as I've been doing since the late 1990s, I tend to do my Oscar picks in the categories that I care about.  I mean, you're going to get all kinds of speculation for the big ones like Best Picture and Best Actor and Best Actress and stuff like that.  So, when I started doing this, I started by focusing on the categories that I care about:  Best Original Song and Best Visual Effects.  So let's take a look at what we've got.

Best Visual Effects

The nominees are:

• The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey
• Life of Pi
• The Avengers
• Prometheus
• Snow White and the Huntsman

Wow, lots of good choices there.  I think that, when it comes to The Hobbit, the Academy will probably do what they did with The Lord of the Rings.  They'll save all the awards for the third and final film.  So that's probably out of the running.  Snow White and the Huntsman, didn't see it, can't speak to it.  And as much as I loved The Avengers, I really don't think there's anything new and groundbreaking visual effects-wise.  However, the one that the critics keep coming back to...the one that they keep raving about the effects in, is Life of Pi.  Everyone's taking about it's use of 3D, and how a combination of a real tiger, animatronics, and CGI is all coupled together to bring the film's tiger to life.

My Prediction:  Life of Pi

Best Original Song

The nominees are:

• "Before My Time" from Chasing Ice
• "Everybody Needs a Best Friend" from Ted
• "Pi's Lullaby" from Life of Pi
• "Skyfall" from Skyfall
• "Suddenly" from Les Miserables

This category has gotten tougher and tougher for me to call.  The main reason why I started predicting this one back in the 1990s was because, in the 90s, Disney animated films ruled this category.  But I don't think a Disney movie has been nominated in this category for a great many year.  Most of these songs, I have not heard.  I'll try to link all the nominees up there to the song on YouTube.  But let's see..being a James Bond fan, I thought Skyfall the song was pretty good.  Ted was from the creators of Family Guy, and I see that Everybody Needs a Best Friend was done by all the composers who work on Family Guy.  They've done some good songs, it would be nice to see them win.  But still, the critics generally love Les Miserables, and with people saying the film was shunned because it didn't pick up nominees for  Best Director, so I'm sure a lot of people will go for that one.

My Prediction:  Les Miserables

Best Animated Film

It's funny...I just wrote up a Fishing in the Discount Bin for Chicken Run, and as the urban legend goes, this category was created because the Academy felt guilty about not being able to give Chicken Run anything.  I started predicting this one when the category was new 11 years ago, and I was still running down to the theatre to see every new animated movie that came out.  Which reminds me...I think I'm due for another Animated Film Catch-Up.  Anyway, the nominees are:

• Brave
• Frankenweenie
• ParaNorman
• The Pirates!: Band of Misfits
• Wreck-It Ralph

Wow!  I've seen three out five nominations this year!  I think that's a personal record.  This seems like a category that'll be too close to call.  While Brave really didn't gel for me, Pixar is an Oscar darling.  I missed The Pirates! in its theatrical release, but I still really want to see it, because it's from the UK's Aardman Animations, which is another Oscar darling.  And ParaNorman, while it fizzled at the box office, got a lot of love from the critics.  With this one, though, I'm really leaning towards Wreck-It Ralph, because when I went to see it, I found it to be very pleasantly surprising, so maybe the Academy will feel that way, too.

My Prediction:  Wreck-It Ralph

And, as always, just to sell out and be mainstream, let's do the big one, shall we?

Best Picture

• Amour
• Argo
• Beasts of the Southern Wild
• Django Unchained
• Les Miserables
• Life of Pi
• Lincoln
• Silver Linings Playbook
• Zero Dark Thirty

 Wow, I have seen a grand total of one of these films.  That would be Django.  I still don't like the fact that they increased it from 5 films to 10 films.  Well, it's not 10 films anymore.  It's "as many as their needs to be."  The goal was to open it up and include more mainstream films, so people would stop going, "Oh, those are all films I've never heard of."  And, well, all that seems to have happened is we get more films that no one has heard of.  So I think I'm just going to pick a name out of a hat here

My Prediction:  Les Miserables

The Oscars are on February 24 this year.  Seth MacFarlane, creator of Family Guy, is the host.

Fishing in the Discount Bin - Astro Boy

And here we go again with Fishing in the Discount Bin, my weekly look at one of the many DVDs in my video library.  Today, we conclude our retrospective on the films of Imagi Studios with their second, and sadly, final film, Astro Boy.  This entry is originally dated June 9, 2012.

Django Unchained Review is Up

My review of Django Unchained is now online!

Head on over to my main site to check it out:  www.chaosinabox.com. 

Obtaining the Holy Grail

Well, Christmas vacation 2012/2013 is coming to a close.  I took 2 weeks off for my Christmas vacation, rather than my usual 1 week.  Around the middle of November I got an e-mail from the boss, informing me of my unused vacation days and asking me to use them up.  I was taken aback, usually because I get that e-mail in the middle of January and I take a week off in February to use them up.  But everything seemed to be moving ahead of schedule this year, so I proposed doubling my Christmas vacation to get those unused days off the books, which everyone around the office seemed to be OK with.

And boy, do I know how to cap off a vacation or what, because for my final day (yesterday), I made...A DENTIST'S APPOINTMENT!  Yup, got my teeth cleaned.  I made the usual small talk with the hygienist, which usually revolves around why a guy from Athabasca goes all the way to Spruce Grove to see the dentist.  Quite simple really:  every time I start asking around Athabasca, the dentists in the area keep telling me they're not taking new patients.  So finally I said, "Screw it, I'll keep going to my regular guy."

Besides, it gives me a reason to take a day off work, and as we've already established, I have a real problem with not using up my vacation days.  

So, with a mouthful of clean teeth, I was off to Edmonton to spend all those lovely, wonderful Christmas gift cards.  First stop:  Wal-mart.  For you see, I was in need of a new pair of shoes.  Now that winter is in full swing, I wearing snow boots, of course, but what to do when I get to work?  I don't like wearing the snow boots around the office, because wearing them all day, the feet got hot and sweaty -- and not in the good way.  So I like to slip off the boots and wear some more comfortable footwear.  I know some colleagues at some of our sister stations have been known to wear slippers or Crocs, but a few years back a memo was sent out, saying that such footwear is officially frowned upon.  My solution:  cheap, $10 runners.  And my usual pair of "office runners" had become worn down to just nothing.  Seriously, it was like binding my feet in rags.

After I got my new shoes, and a few shirts I liked, I fell back into old habits and headed to the toy section to see if there were any new action figures I wanted to obtain for my collection.  And yes, there were.  A few years back, they started this group of Star Wars figures called "The Vintage Collection," where the packaging is designed to look like the original Star Wars figures from the early-80s, and I'm a sucker for that retro stuff.

I remember the summer of 1999, when me and most of my friends were in a cloud of new Star Wars stuff, thanks to the release of The Phantom Menace.  For those few of my friends who dove head-first into the new Expanded Universe stuff that came along, they were quick to tell me that Aurra Sing - a character with barely a second of screen time in Episode I, was quickly becoming a rising star in the Star Wars fanfic community.  So, with all those memories of my friends telling me about the awesomeness of Aurra Sing, I figured I should grab her action figure.

As I've blogged before, I never really got into the animated series Star Wars: The Clone Wars.  Seeing the very-bad movie version that started the series was when I officially declared myself burnt out on Star Wars.  Although, my friends who've stuck with it tell me it's gotten a lot better as the TV seasons wore on.  As such, The Clone Wars is vastly under-represented in my collection.  But, from what I did see, I do know that Ahsoka Tano is one of the stars of the show, being the Jedi apprentice of Anakin Skywalker.  She's a tragic character without knowing she's tragic...as we all know from the events of Revenge of the Sith, she's going to die.  As she's not in Revenge of the Sith, she'll probably die in the final episode of The Clone Wars.  But she'll live forever, encased in carbonite blister packaging.

Now I was off to Best Buy, to start spending my Best Buy gift cards.  I already had one Blu-Ray picked out.  As you know, I'm a huge fan of the folks over at Pixar.  And, in late fall, they released their second compilation of the short films, entitled The Pixar Short Film Collection Volume 2.  So, of course, Pixar junkie that I am, I knew I had to get it.  That was the only one I was planning to get, but as you may recall, I blogged a few months ago that, as part of the Skyfall hype, pretty much all of the James Bond films are now being released to Blu-Ray.  And I saw the brand-new Blu-Ray release of the Timothy Dalton Bond The Living Daylights.  The Living Daylights was the one I had earmarked to be upgraded to Blu-Ray next, as I have the basic edition DVD with no bonus features.  And there was the shiny new Blu-Ray, loaded with all the bonus features...for just $6.99!  How could I say no when the price was so ridiculously low?

New DVDs in hand, it was now off to West Edmonton Mall to catch a movie the way it was meant to be seen...on the big screen.  I just wasn't going to let my Christmas vacation end without catching a movie.  (While I'm at it, apologies to my mother, who was really hoping I'd take her to see Les Miz before going home.  Being the only one in the family who actually takes time to go to movies anymore, most all of my family waits for me to come visit so they have an excuse to go to the movies.)  But before I was off to the movies, there was a small side trip.

As I blogged a couple of weeks ago, my Holy Grail of Star Wars action figures has been the McQuarrie Concept Stormtrooper.  Every time I got to the city, I swing by the comic book and collectible shops to see if one is in...and to see if the price is something I can afford.  Many years ago, when I started this action figure collecting hobby, I said I'd never pay more than $20 for a figure.  And, if you've never been to a comic book and collectibles shop to buy an action figure, let me tell you, they are rarely less than $20 in those places.  Now, as you'll recall in that blog entry from a few weeks ago, one of my shops in West Edmonton Mall had the McQuarrie Concept Stormtrooper for $25.  Just $5 more than my self-imposed limit, when such a limit made sense to a 14-year old kid working part-time in a grocery store.  So I sucked it up and walked away, because I guess I don't like spending five extra dollars to be happy.  I fully expected it wouldn't be back when I returned.

I returned and...it was still there.  And, even better, it had been marked down to the "Mark can sleep at night" price of $19.99.  I could not believe that it had been marked down to less than $20.  Not even the clerk could believe it when he rung it up for me!  "I paid a lot more than $19.99 for mine on eBay," he grumbled, as he placed it in a shopping bag.

So, ladies and gentlemen, it gives me a great sense of joy and accomplishment to reveal to you my Holy Grail of Star Wars action figures...the McQuarrie Concept Stormtroooper.

It's a Stormtroooper!  With a lightsaber!  And a shield!  How awesome is that?

As great as it would have been to call it a day after that, there was one last thing left to do.  I went to see Django Unchained.  The latest from Quentin Tarantino, as he offers up his rendition of the Spaghetti western.  Set 2 years before the Civil War, Jaimie Foxx plays Django, a freed slave who becomes a bounty hunter and goes after the ruthless plantation owner that bought his wife.  Christopher Waltz, the German actor who won an Oscar for Tarantino's last film, Inglorious Basterds, plays Dr. King Shultz, the dentist-turned-bounty hunter who frees Django, and becomes Django's partner, best friend, and mentor in the bounty hunting trade.  And Leonardo diCaprio plays the ruthless plantation owner. Calvin Candee.

The usual Tarantino flourishes are there, in the dialogue and the blood.  My God, the blood...probably Tarantino's bloodiest film.  Not his most violent...but definitely his bloodiest, as each gunshot just sends out geysers of blood.  Probably his most cameo-filled movie too, as Tarantino loves bringing out these fondly remembered actors from TV and exploitation movies and giving them one more shot.  The one cameo I was pleasantly surprised to spot was Tom Wopat, Luke Duke from The Dukes of Hazzard, showing up as a Texas marshal.

(Another Dukes of Hazzard reference I kept getting...it's established that Calvin Candee's plantation is in Chickasaw Country...in The Dukes of Hazzard, Chickasaw County was Hazzard County's neighouring county.)

If I have a complaint, that would be that this is the first Tarantino movie where I felt it kind of dragged in places...it felt about a half-hour too long.  It was like Tarantino was allowed his indulgences a little too much.

All in all, though, a very entertaining film, and another great addition to the Tarantino filmography. 

And that's it!  Christmas vacation 2012 draws to close, and I'm back at work on Monday.  I'm buff, I'm tan, I'm well-rested.  I should take vacations more often. 

Fishing in the Discount Bin - TMNT

Time again for Fishing in the Discount Bin, my weekly look at one of the many DVDs in my collection.  This time around, I attempt to get all serious and analytical, but the film I choose to do it with is TMNT, aka the computer animated Ninja Turtles movie.  This entry's originally dated June 8, 2012.

Fishing in the Discount Bin - The Secret World of Arrietty

Welcome back to Fishing in the Discount Bin, my weekly evidence that I have too much time on my hands because I watch one of the many movies in my video library and blog about it.  This time out, we're chatting up the latest Sudio Ghibli release that got a major theatrical release in North America...The Secret World of Arrietty.  This entry is originally dated May 26, 2012.

News from Markworld: 2012 in Review

As I began doing last year, allow me to blog my annual Christmas card letter, in the off chance that those friends who've drifted away may wonder whatever became of me and are googling my name one night.

Good tidings, all!  Mark Cappis here, with my annual Christmas newsletter, letting you know the things that happened to me in the year that was.

I know, I try to get this out at the start of December, so I can get new snail mail addresses and update the Christmas card list, but as I’ve been trying to write this, I find myself encountering a terrible case of writer’s block.  No matter how hard I wrack my brain, I just can’t find any interesting tidbits or sparkling bits of news to pass along.

Not the most attention grabbing intro to a newsletter, I know.

Nevertheless, the fact remains that, at some point in the past, we knew each other.  And whatever our relationship was, it convinced me that you might be interested in knowing what’s happening to me.  So...here’s what’s happening.


What’s Going On In My Life
You’ll still find me up in Athabasca, Alberta...far enough north for most to be considered the remote part of the north.  I’m still working at 94.1 the River, the radio station in Athabasca, and filling the role of “wacky morning guy.”  Come springtime, I’ll have been working here for seven years.  Yup, the same length as the average Star Trek TV series.  It’s a little bit strange.  Back in the days of minimum wage crap jobs, when you’re there for six months and then move on to another one, the thought of staying in one job for seven years is somewhat alien.  But now that it’s approaching, I find it somewhat comforting.  Obviously, someone must be liking what I’m doing to keep me around for so long.  And I must be liking what I’m doing to stick around for so long. 

When we last spoke one year ago, I revealed that the low pay that comes with radio had gotten me down, so I’d gotten a second job at Buy-Low Foods.  Well, I gave that up back in May.  As much as I appreciated the additional income, I was just starting to find it too difficult to balance the two schedules.  Granted, this means that finances are incredibly tight, but I’m managing. 

And really, that’s it.  Oh, and I saw The Avengers.  That movie is so good, you guys. 


Favourite Quote of the Year
“Puny god.” – Spoken by the Hulk, after he pounds the tar out of the evil Norse god Loki, in The Avengers.  Dude, when I saw this in the theatre, the audience was laughing so hard, I actually missed it.

To Be Found, You Must Make Yourself Visible
As always, my online footprint is massive, and you can always find out what I’m up to with a click of a mouse:

Chaos in a Box.com (my website):  www.chaosinabox.com

Midnight Ramblings (my blog):  www.chaosinabox.blogspot.com

U62: The Targ (my podcast):  www.chaosinabox.com/targ

My work blog:  www.941theriver.ca

Facebook (personal page):  www.facebook.com/chaosinabox

Facebook (fan page):  www.facebook.com/officialchaosinabox

Twitter:  www.twitter.com/chaosinabox

My YouTube Channel, where I sometimes make videos:  www.youtube.com/mcappis911

Google+:  https://plus.google.com/105350704002510248210/posts


...And the Adventure Continues...
We’re reaching the end now, which is good, because I’ve struggled long enough to come up with things to say.  In the end, all I can think of is what they taught me in school.  When you don’t know what to say, just wrap it up and go to the next song.

Some things in life are bad
They can really make you mad
Other things just make you swear and curse
When you’re chewin’ on life’s gristle
Don’t grumble!  Give a whistle!
And this’ll help things turn out for the best....

‘Til next year!

Mark Cappis

 

Fishing in the Discount Bin - American Graffiti

We're rolling right along with Fishing in the Discount Bin.  Today, we get to one of the films that George Lucas made before he became "the Star Wars guy"...American Graffiti.  This entry is originally dated May 25, 2012.  

Star Trek Into Darkness Teaser

WOO!  The one big summer blockbuster of 2013 is finally giving us its first glimpse.  And that would be Star Trek Into Darkness, the sequel to 2009's critically acclaimed reboot of Star Trek.

"But Mark," you're saying.  "Why are you just blogging about it now?  The trailer's been online for a few weeks."  What, you're talking about this?




That's actually the "announcement teaser." That's right, movie promotion has gotten so ridiculous these days that trailers have trailers.  Before I started typing up a blog entry, I wanted to wait for the full trailer, which went online yesterday!

I know that 2009's gritty reboot of Star Trek had its detractors.  Many die-hard Trekkies felt that the optimism and the bright future predicted by Gene Roddenberry, and the haughty sci-fi and weighty debates about the human condition were abandoned to make just another big dumb action movie.  To be fair, many made the some complaint about the Next Generation films, too.  I, though, loved 2009's Star Trek to pieces.  For the first time in a long time, it was a Star Trek movie that actually felt like a movie.  It was critically acclaimed, was a massive hit, and it looked like Star Trek was back in a big way.

The sequel was originally supposed to come out this past summer, but director J.J. Abrams got so busy making Super 8 that the film wound up getting pushed back.  Alex Kurtzman and Robert Orci, the writers of the first film, are returning to scripting duties, and this time around their bringing their fellow Lost writer and guy who wrote Prometheus, Damon Lindelof.

The entire cast of the first film is back, led by Chris Pine as Captain James T. Kirk and Zachary Quinto as Spock.  And this time around, they're doing battle with a mysterious villain played by Bennedict Cumberbatch, best known as Sherlock Holmes on Sherlock, and the current #1 pin-up boy for many a girl geek.

Speculation is still running rampant on who the villain may be.  Along with the release of this trailer, came the revelation of the character's name:  John Harrison.  Those more knowledgeable in Star Trek canon than I have identified John Harrison as a very minor background character who was in a dozen or so episodes of the original series.  Many are saying that this is just an alias, and John Harrison's true identity will be revealed in the film, much like how Marion Cotillard's character in The Dark Knight Rises was originally announced as Miranda Tate, but as the film went on, we learned she was actually a very familiar Batman character.

Ever since the end credits rolled on the first one, the #1 contender for the villain has been Khan.  During interviews for Dredd, Karl Urban, reprising his role as Dr. Leonard "Bones" McCoy, let slip that the villain is Gary Mitchell.  Mitchell was the villain on the original series' second pilot, Where No Man Has Gone Before.  Mitchell was one Capt. Kirk's dearest friends who was granted God-like powers when he came into contact with a mysterious energy barrier at the edge of the galaxy.  Kirk was then forced to kill his friend before he went mad with power and re-made the universe in his image.  So who is the villain?  We'll know for certain when the movie comes out.

But, something that didn't get as much fanfare was the announcement of another returning character.  It was revealed that Alice Eve is in the cast as...Dr. Carol Marcus.  For those who've never seen Wrath of Khan, Dr. Marcus was an old flame of of Capt. Kirk's, and the mother of Kirk's son.  Might this film include the conception?  Does this connection to Wrath of Khan lend more support to the theory that Khan is the villain?

Many mysteries are surrounding this film right now.  And I like that.  That's why I'm kind of reluctant to go see The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey in IMAX because I don't want to see the first 9 minutes.

But enough of my rambling!  Here's the full trailer!




In the off-chance the YouTube police have it taken down by the time this goes up on Tuesday morning, here's the link to see it at the Apple Trailers website.

So what are my thoughts on this?  Very similar to my thoughts upon seeing the trailer for the first film.  I'm still getting used to seeing Star Trek on such an epic scale.  The mystery of the villain is really played up, and I'm starting to get really, really interested.  And the whole thing with doing the Vulcan salute through the glass?  Man, they're really playing up the allusions to Wrath of Khan.

Needless to say, I will be there on May 17, when it hits theatres.  

Hobbit Review is Online!

My review of The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey is now online.

Head on over to the main site to give it a read. 

There And Back Again ("But that's the name of the third movie." "Read the book.")

Went to the city today, and I come home with a sense of incompleteness.  As I sit here, and gaze at my collection of Star Wars action figures, I still feel incomplete.

Went to the city today.  Went browsing at some of my favourite comic book and collectable stores.  And there, on the shelves for the first time in a long time, I spied my holy grail of Star Wars action figures...the McQuarrie concept Stormtrooper.

For those who don't know, Ralph McQuarrie was the artist who did the concept art for the original Star Wars trilogy.  He very much designed what Star Wars looked like.  And, a few years back, they made a batch of Star Wars action figures that were 100% faithful to McQuarrie's original designs.  While I did snatch up most of the McQuarrie concepts that appealed to me, the one I never got was the McQuarrie Concept Stormtrooper.  Compared to the Stormtrooper we know and love from Star Wars, there's a lot less black highlights in the uniform...he's almost all-white.  And he's armed with a shield and a lightsaber.

I'd love to have a McQuarrie Concept Stormtrooper in my collection.  But the price tag was $25.  Despite my extensive collection, I have never bought an action figure in a comic book and collectable store.  No matter how tempting it is, I've never been able to bring myself to spend more than $20 for something I can get down the street at Toys R Us for $6.99.

So I stared at that McQuarrie Concept Stormtrooper for a good long while...and then I walked away.

And then I went over to where they have the Doctor Who toys.  And I found...the Eleventh Doctor.  The current Doctor.  Mr. "Bow ties are cool himself."  Now again, I would love to get an action figure of the Doctor.  My buddy went to England about a year ago, and brought me back a TARDIS that he bought at a London comic book store.  I would love love love to have a Doctor to display in the TARDIS.  But again, he's really hard to find.  First, you've got the import factor working against you.  And secondly, the scarcity.  You can never find him, and with good reason.  He's the hero.  Everybody wants the star of the show.

And finally, there he was.  In the shop.  But for $25.

So I stared at that Eleventh Doctor action figure for a good long while...and then I walked away.

I'm sure some of you think this is insane.  How could one purposely choose to not complete a collection like this?  I don't know.  Maybe I'm at the age where I'm finally recognizing the difference between needs and wants.  And while I want an action figure, that $25 can buy a meal I need.  Or maybe I just get off on torturing myself.

All I know is those figures won't be there next time I go to the city.  I rarely get a second chance when it comes to buying action figures.  Others snap them up so quickly.  Oh, well.  Like the guy in the movie says, may I never be complete.

Speaking of my buddy who bought me a TARDIS, I was in the city today to meet up with him.  He texted me earlier in the week and said, "Hey.  I think we should head to the city this weekend, exchange our Christmas gifts, and see The  Hobbit."  And that's what we did. 

So what are my thoughts on the first in this Hobbit trilogy, subtitled An Unexpected Journey.  Well, as I'm been blogging for years, I've never really been able to get into The Lord of the Rings, but I love love love The Hobbit.  I count it as one of my favourite books.  Whereas The Lord of the Rings is bogged down in exposition, The Hobbit is light on it and instead focuses on the adventure.

So I started having doubts about The Hobbit when I learned that they would be expanding the one book into a trilogy.  As I was reading online, not only did they leave in all the exposition, but they poured through J.R.R. Tolkein's notes and appendixes and added even more exposition.  So I walked into The Hobbit with some lowed expectations.  It sounded like they took everything I hated about The Lord of the Rings and put it into The Hobbit.

But still, I was excited for the film.  When it started, and Howard Shore's familiar themes started up, I just couldn't help but smile.  And the good thing about these films being so long is...it's all there.  Everything.  All your favourite scenes.  I really perked up when Gollum made his appearance and he and Bilbo had their famous riddle contest.  And the scene with the trolls was straight out of the books.  It's all there.

But I did have problems.  There's fat that can be trimmed...and a lot of it has to do with the new stuff that was added.  There's a subplot with a wizard named Ragdast the Brown and he brings news of a new evil known as the Necromancer.  Thorin, leader of the dwarves, gets a personal arch-enemy in the form of an orc king that me met in battle years before.  It feels so...unnecessary. 

And, being a prequel, I found it did have a few of the problems that the Star Wars prequels have.  The filmmakers seem to have an obsession with matching the story beats with its corresponding film in the original trilogy.  And they occasionally desire to recreate scenes from the original trilogy.  Sometimes it's cute...sometimes it's distracting.

But when's all said and done, I found it to be a very enjoyable film.  It's nice going back to Middle Earth.

After that, my buddy and I exchanged our gifts, and we went our separate ways.  He was off to his girlfriend's LARP group Christmas party.  He invited me along, but I declined.  I hate going to parties where I only know one guy there.  Hell, I hate going to parties in general.  Part of the reason I got into the job I did...I can only seem to talk to people if I have a microphone.

But on the drive home, I began reflecting on LARPs.  For those who don't know, LARP stands for "live action role playing."  It's a role playing game, like Dungeons and Dragons, only instead of just simply sitting around a table rolling dice, you actually dress up in costume and act it out.  I remember explaining to a friend, and he said, "So like, what, they go out into the middle of the woods and sacrifice a dead pig?"

"No," I said.  "They rent a church basement and just pretend to sacrifice dead pigs."

Role playing games is just one of those aspects of being a geek that I've never embraced.  Yeah, me and a few friends in high school played a little D&D during lunch hours.  But then I got to college, and most of my college friends looked down on D&D as being "a child's game" and played role playing games that were 10 times more complicated.  They invited me to observe their games a few times in an effort to get me hooked, but that didn't last long.  I couldn't get through a game without heckling the proceedings, so they banned me.  That's probably what killed my burgeoning interest.  Every player I knew took it so fucking seriously.

Did I ever tell you my experience my LARPs?  I've told others in conversation, but I don't think I've ever put pen-to-paper.  So back when I was going to NAIT to get my broadcasting degree, one of the assignments in writing class is to find a non-profit organization (NPO) in the city and design an ad campaign for them.  One of my dearest friends was a pretty big wheel in Edmonton's LARP community at the time, and told me that one of her LARP groups actually had NPO status.  So I was going to do a radio ad campaign for LARPs.  I presented the proposal to my writing teacher, and she was thrilled, as this was vastly different from the usual charities that most students usually do.  But then, when I mentioned that the client was a friend of mine, my teacher rolled her eyes and sarcastically said, "Oh.  So when it comes to the part where the client has to grade you, something tells me that you'll do very well."

So for those who've never written radio commercials, you have to do some product research so you know what to cram into your 30-second spots.  And for this LARP group, they didn't have any pamphelts or flyers that I could go off of.  And it was fun.  I got to hang out with my friend, meet all her friends, quiz them excessively about their group, but everyone agreed, for me to fully understand, I'd have to come down to a game.  And these guys were hardcore into LARPs.  They didn't allow an audience into their games.  If you come, you play.

A few weeks later, there I was, at a conference room at the Coast Terrace Inn in Edmonton, being handed a black robe and given a quick briefing on my character.  Apparently, I was going to be some kind of M. Night Shamylan plot twist where I was a long-lost bastard son of one of the vampire clans.  And in I went.  Now, as you'll recall, my friend took her role playing games very seriously.  And I knew all these people took the game very seriously.  I remembered one of those games in college where, one of the players did something so unexpected, that my friend, as the one in charge of the game, had to shut things down for about 20 minutes so she could figure out how this unexpected thing affected the entire game she had planned.  So I was scared out of my mind.  For all I knew, if I sneezed I probably would have altered the whole thing.  So I kept my mouth shut and stayed at the edges until I had everything I needed.  My friend told me a few days later that I really pissed off a few of the players by doing that, because "quiet guy in the corner who has no fucking clue what's going on" was not one of my character's traits.

But now, with my client research done, it was time to get to work.  I designed the ad campaign, pointed out the flaws in their previous campaigns and suggested solutions, wrote commercials that ran on NR92, NAIT's college station, and even produced them over in production class.  I sent it all off to my friend for the client's part of the grading, and then gave the whole kitinkaboodle to my writing teacher for the final grade.

A keystone in NAIT's broadcasting program is their college station NR92.  Essentially, for a good chunk of the program, they put you to work at the station, so you get a lot of hands-on experience right out of the gate.  But...you only work at the station from 9 - 5.  After hours, we students were free to do our own shows in the classic college radio tradition.

So there I was one night, chilling out in the control room of NR92, doing Chaos in a Box 2.0, when my writing teacher comes in, wanting to have a chat.  She sits down and she starts talking.  She mentions that she remembered me mentioning that the client for my NPO project was a friend of mine, and she wanted to know if I was currently on the outs with this friend, or if we'd had a fight lately.  I said no, we hadn't.  And my teacher says that she was wanted to know because, she was grading the NPO projects, had just read the client evaluation on my LARP ad campaign, and in all her years of doing this, she found it to be one of the harshest client evaluations she`d ever read.  She was wondering if my friend was mad at me and just being vindictive.  But since the answer was "no" on all counts, my teacher left and went back to grading.

A few minutes later, my writing teacher comes back in.  Her earlier tone of concern had now been replaced with one of elation.  She shared with me my friend's client evaluation, and at the end, in the "additional comments" section, my friend wrote something like, "We found Mark's analysis of our previous ad campaigns and their strengths and weaknesses to be highly effective.  We will be adopting most, if not all, of Mark's recommendations in our future ad campaigns."  Apparently, never in the history of this assignment, had a student's recommendations completely re-shaped an NPO's advertising strategy.

Needless to say, I wound up doing very well on the assignment.  And that's my only experience with LARPs. 

Gritty Reboots of Great American Heroes

Well, the age of the gritty reboot is upon us.  This past week, we got flooded with a bunch of new trailers for 2013's summer blockbusters, and the two that are standing out for me right now are the gritty reboots of two classic, boy-scout-ish, superheroes.

The first one that came along was for Disney's gritty reboot of The Lone Ranger, starring Armie Hammer as the Lone Ranger and Johnny Depp as Tonto, from the makers of the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise.




I'm still having the same problems with this that I had with the first trailer that came out a few months ago.  I'm just not used to seeing the Lone Ranger this dark and gritty.  I miss hearing the William Tell Overture.  And all that stuff in there about being "a spirit walker...one who has been to the other side and returned...one who cannot be killed in battle."  I said it before, that supernatural BS doesn't belong in The Lone Ranger.

But still...consider my curiosity piqued.

The other one was for Man of Steel, aka the new Superman movie.  Warner Brothers second attempt to reboot the Superman franchise after Superman Returns underwhelmed.  I've blogged it before and I'll blog it again:  I think Superman Returns was a movie that needed to be made.  With the original Superman films being such an indelible part of pop culture, I'm sure people were expecting the reboot to pay homage to it in some way.  Now that the homage is out of our systems, we can  head on to a fresh interpretation.

And a fresh interpretation we are getting.  Zack Snyder  (300, Watchmen) directs, with The Dark Knight Trilogy's director Christopher Nolan on board as a producer.  Funny thing is, Snyder was originally offered Superman Returns, but turned it down saying he couldn't get a handle on the character.  So, The Dark Knight folks must have come up with a take that made it accessible to Snyder.

Henry Cavill is Clark Kent/Kal-El/Superman, Amy Adams is Lois Lane, Laurence Fishburne is Perry White, Kevin Costner is Pa Kent, and Russel Crowe is Jor-El.




I'm still not sure what to make of this.  This is definitely a lot more moody than I thought I'd be.  Not so sure that the angst kind of works with Superman.  But, they get the iconography right.  Love that shot of Superman on fire, but the flames aren't burning him.  And that music...I'm missing John Williams.

This just looks so different from what we've come to know and love about Superman.  And different is good.  So I'm willing to give it a shot.  

Fishing in the Discount Bin - Goofin' on NetFlix

Welcome back to Fishing in the Discount Bin, my weekly ramble about one of the many movies in my home video library.  Something very different this time out.  Back during the May long weekend, I helped my parents get hooked up for NetFlix, and wound up wasting the weekend going through the NetFlix catalogue.  This is my chronicle of that weekend.  Originally dated May 21, 2012.

Wreck-It Ralph Review

My review for Wreck-It Ralph is now online!

Head on over to my movie review page to give it a read!

The Pick Me Up I Needed

Christmas is here, and I'll admit, I'm finding it rather rough this year.  Finances are a lot tighter that I thought they'd be, and when I'm out there getting my shopping done, whenever I look at price tags, I feel like going home and crying.  Like I've told a couple of friends, you know you don't make much money when you're interviewing the folks from the food bank, you accidentally let slip how much money you make, and they suddenly switch from pressuring you to donate to pressuring you to take home a hamper.

That's just a sad truth of the radio biz, kids:  there's not much money in sitting on your butt and talking.

But still, I have responsibilities and obligations, and at this time of year, that means getting the Christmas shopping done.  This seemed like a good weekend to do it, and so I was off to the city!

High on my list was taking care of my nieces, so I was heading for Toys R Us.  I've been told that one of my nieces is reaching the pony age that all little girls go through, so I was off to the My Little Pony aisle.  I wanted to get in and get out quick, so I wouldn't be mistaken for a Brony.  Far be it from me to criticize another's fandom, but I just think that middle aged virgins should stick to the Star Wars action figure aisle.

With that done, and the final names on my list checked off, I was in the mood for a movie.  Not much out there right now that I want to see.  I saw SkyFall a few weeks ago, and The Hobbit doesn't come out until next week, so I settled on Wreck-It Ralph.  I'll admit, the trailers for Wreck-It Ralph weren't grabbing me.  I had a similar issue with Scott Pilgrim vs. the World.  Yeah, I had an Atari when I was a kid, but I never graduated to a Nintendo or a SNES.  I've just never been much of a gamer.  So, I don't get all misty-eyed for The Legend of Zelda or Street Fighter II like some of my compatriots do.  As such, the trailers for Wreck-It Ralph were just looking like Video Game Nostalgia: The Movie.  But, I was reading lots of good reviews from the geek circles and the film websites, so I figured I'd give it a chance.

It all takes place in an arcade.  After hours, all of the video game characters come to life and hang out with each other.  Our hero is Wreck-It Ralph, the villain in a video game called Fix It Felix Jr.  And Ralph is getting tired of being the villain and being hated by everyone and the dude just wants a little appreciation for what he does.  So, these feelings make him decide to abandon his game and journey from game to game in a quest to prove himself a good guy for once.  And his quest eventually leads him to a cart racer called Sugar Rush where he becomes the only friend and ally to a little girl, Vanelope Von Schweetz, who's going through pretty much the same thing he is.

The one review I read online that finally convinced me to see it was one that read, "In 2012, it's like Disney made the Pixar movie and Pixar made the Disney movie."  And I totally understand that now.  Brave follows Disney's "princess" formula pretty closely, and Wreck-It Ralph follows Pixar's "buddy movie" formula pretty closely as well.  And since I'm programed to be a Pixar junkie, I wound up falling in love with Wreck-It Ralph.  I found this movie to be surprisingly good.  The friendships that form in this film, and the character development, it all seems genuine.  I felt for these characters, and whenever a movie can make me do that, I regard that as a good movie.

As I blogged many years ago, seeing a good movie can be a great pick-me-up.  And Wreck-It Ralph provided me with just the pick-me-up I needed to get through this holiday season.  Granted, the season isn't done yet, but it's getting better. 

One last thing I want to mention before I go.  Perhaps the most subtle joke in all of Wreck-It Ralph.  Way back in the early 1980s, when arcade games were becoming a thing, a duo called Buckner and Garcia recorded an album of novelty songs all about the video games of the era.  It scored them the one-hit wonder, Pac-Man Fever.  Well, for Wreck-It Ralph, Disney found whatever casino Buckner and Garcia are currently performing in and got them to write a song about Wreck-It Ralph.  Just might be worth picking up the soundtrack for it.

Fishing in the Discount Bin - MASH

Welcome back to Fishing in the Discount Bin, my weekly ode to how much time I have on my hands by watching one of the many movies in my home movie library and blogging about it.  Today, we have the source material for a very famous TV show, MASH.  This review is originally dated May 5, 2012.

Christmas IDs for the Targ

I've been waiting for the holidays to roll around so that way I can share this radio experiment on the blog!

So, a few years ago, I decided I needed to make some Christmas IDs for my podcast, U62: The Targ.  Ah, yes, I remember the genesis now.  The Shrek Christmas special, Shrek the Halls, was premiering with a lot of hype, and I thought, "Hey!  Christmas IDs!  And I'll be sure to tape the Shrek Christmas special and get in something from Shrek!"  And I thought the Shrek Christmas special was incredibly lame and didn't find any clips from it that I liked.  But I soldiered on anyway, and still grabbed clips from some of my favourite, classic Christmas specials!


Christmas IDs by Mark Cappis
So, to run down the clips I used in this IDs:

The Weird Al Show: The Obligatory Holiday Episode - As Weird Al says in the intro to this episode of his short-lived kids show, he thought it was best to celebrate every holiday and get them all out of the way.  Which is why I go with "Happy Holidays" instead of "Merry Christmas" in these IDs...just to tie into this joke.

How the Grinch Stole Christmas - Still better in 22 minutes of animation than the Jim Carrey film.

A Charlie Brown Christmas - As I blog every year, there's no better...acknowledgment of season holiday depression.  My mother really likes this one.

A Garfield Christmas - As my sister was nuts for Garfield when we were kids, this was a must to view every year.

The He-Man and She-Ra Christmas Special - Recently re-discovered a few years ago, and has since become a kitsch favourite with kids of the 1980s.  The one power more powerful than the power of Greyskull at defeating Skeletor:  the Christmas spirit.

Simpsons Roasting on an Open Fire (aka the Simpsons Christmas Special) - The very first televised full half-hour of The Simpsons.  Chosen for this mainly because I had the DVD kicking around.

Some day, I will make the one I originally wanted to make alongside these ones, but I couldn't find it online.  Maybe this year.  I also wanted to do one acknowledging that favourite with college kids in the 1990s, A Pinky and the Brain Christmas.  For those who don't remember it, Brain's latest scheme for world domination is he's created a doll with mind-controlling capabilities.  And he wants to infiltrate Santa's workshop by disguising himself and Pinky as elves, trick the elves into mass-producing it and Santa into distributing it to the world.  And as t hey parachute into the North Pole, Pinky and the Brain have this exchange:

Pinky>>  I've changed my mind, Brain!  I don't want to be an elf anymore!

Brain>>  Really, Pinky?  What do you want to be?

Pinky>>  A dentist!

Brain>>  (pause)  You've watched far too many Christmas specials, Pinky. 

Some day, I will make that.