Something Old, Something New

Blogs are for people with little to do, and even less to say - Author Unknown.

Back in 2001, I was reading this advice columnist in the Edmonton Journal by the name of Caroline Hax. The letter she received was from a young woman who went on a couple of dates with a guy, he mentioned he had a blog, she read that blog, and was now totally creeped out by that guy. Hax's advice? "Dump him immediatly. Anyone who keeps a blog is an attention-starved loser." Those are words that have haunted me in everything I do online.

I started this blog back in 2003. I was in Japan at the time, and my laptop crapped out on me. I no longer had a way to update my website. I desired a quick and easy way to maintain my online presence at public terminals, such as the Internet cafes. Back them, maintaining an online presence was very important to me.

Other friends at the time were running blogs on Blogger, so that seemed like the thing to do. And, on a warm April day at Manga Hiroba in the Kumagaya train station, I started Midnight Ramblings.

And my blog has remained largely unchanged...until today. Blogger itself has undergone several changes in the past six years, and my blog template was no longer compatible with the newest and greatest and idiot-proof features at Blogger.

So after mulling it over for a few months, today I bit the bullet and upgraded my template. Of course, I then heavily modified it to resemble the old template as much as possible.

And he we are! A new blog layout, as I'm about to start my seventh year of blogging.

Floating to the Top

This might sound weird, but I'm not a big fan of DVD discount bins.

If there's one thing I don't like about DVDs, it's how movies have been turned into a commodity. They're no longer a very complicated art form. They're just another product to be pumped out to fill store shelves. And the discount bin seems to epitomize that to a T.

However, that doesn't stop me from trolling the discount bins, in the odd chance that some super-special edition I missed out on a few years back found its way into the discount bin. In between Straight-to-DVD Comedy Part 3 and Public Domain Cartoon Collection Vol. 4, there is the odd gem that floats to the top.

And that's how I've been feeling the past few days. Ever since I moved to Athabasca, there's been this one film floating in the discount bin down at the wretched hive of scum and villainy. And recently, I started thinking, "If I see that film float to the top again, I think I'll snap it up." Today, it was at the top, and I snapped it up.

And that film is Startup.com, a critically acclaimed 2001 documentary. It chronicles the rise of a dot-com-startup called govWorks.com. We watched them rise to the top of their game, become billionaires overnight, and then, happy ending, right? Nope. Because in the middle of the filming was when the dot-com-bubble burst, and the documentarians kept their cameras rolling as we watched govWorks.com fall apart.

It became the defining film of the dot-com-boom, and for only $3 in the discount bin, I was like, "Why not?"

Don't think I'll be able to watch it until the weekend though, and I'm still plowing my way through Space: Above and Beyond -- The Complete Series. Great show.

I've got so many DVDs I need a schedule to figure out when I'm going to watch them all.

And speaking of DVDs, I've been thinking about the movie rating system I use on my website. I use the patented Nib system, where I rate films on a scale of 1 to 4 nibs. I'm thinking of overhauling it. Instead of Nibs, I think I should rate them on how much money I'm willing to pay for the DVD. The scale would look like this:

Top Dollar: This is when the DVD has been out of print for a couple years, and you can only find used copies on eBay for upwards of $100. Needless to say, this is the top of the scale.

Suggested Retail Price (SRP): Kind of middle of the road. When you go into your favourite DVD emporium and pull it off the shelf, this is what you pay. Between $20 and $30 is typical.

Discount Bin: Good, but not great. $10 or less.

Tape it off TV: So bad, the only way you'll get a copy is if you get it for free. Maybe you spend 25 cents for the blank DVD.

What do you think? How's that for a movie rating scale?

Movie Bit-Lits

Lots of little movie bits I feel like sharing. First up, if you're like me, then the genre of the teen comedy is probably one that makes you run screaming. But I feel like sharing the trailer for this upcoming teen comedy called I Love You Beth Cooper:





Now, why does this particular teen comedy pique my interest? That would be this:

From the director of Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone and Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets.

That's right, Chris Columbus returned to his teen comedy roots. I say "returned" because his very first film was the 1980s teen comedy Adventures in Babysitting.

Ah, Adventures in Babysitting. For some reason, I saw that one a lot when I was a kid. I keep seeing it in the DVD discount bin, but I never have the money to pick it up....

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Next up, I think this is the best idea for a movie ever.

So we've got your typical Jane Austen comedy of errors...18th Century upper class British women trying to land an upper class husband.

And in the middle of all this, drop a bloodthirsty alien who starts picking them off one by one.

The title? Pride and Predator.

They start filming this summer.

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And finally, I was telling a friend about how movies can evolve over time.

A few years back, a movie was in development called Nottingham. It was a revionist take on the tale of Robin Hood, portraying the Sherriff of Nottingham as a fairly decent guy who was just following orders and Robin Hood as a little more villanous. Ridley Scott signed on to direct, and his old friend Russel Crowe signed on to play the Shrriff.

Anyway, not to long ago, it was reported that Crowe would be playing both the Sheriff and Robin Hood. People went "WTF?" and Scott explained. In the new twist on the tale, Robin Hood kills the Sherrif in one of their early encounters. Thinking he might be able to change things from the inside, Robin Hood then adopts the Sherriff's identity.

Now, Scott is saying that all that stuff is out the window, and it's going to be a straight-up retelling of Robin Hood. Crowe is now playing Robin Hood, and the film is called...Robin Hood.

They begin filming in two months.

Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen Trailer

Well, here it is gang, the first full, official trailer for Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen.






So, let's see here. My thoughts:

• Looks like the Autobots decided to take Optimus Prime up on his invitation in droves. And, Michael Bay thought it would a good way to re-make Armageddon.
• Apparently that big beast thing is how they've reimaged Ravage.
• All the trailers for the first film ended with the Autobot logo. Looks like all these trailers are going to end with the Decepticon logo. Cool.

And we've had absolutely no clue as to what the plot is yet! I guess we'll find out when this comes out at the end of June.

The Story of Family Day

Well, Family Day has come once again to the province of Alberta. And, as I like to do on every Family Day, I like to take moment to remind myself of why we celebrate this day. So please, sit back, as I tell the story of Family Day.

It has long been argued that Canada needs a holiday in February. The break between New Years and Easter is too long, and a long weekend in February would be good for morale as it provides people with a much needed break, and much needed hope. However, our federal leaders have never been able to decide what this holiday should celebrate. So, in the grand Alberta tradition of, "Screw Ottawa! We'll do it ourselves," the Progressive Conservative Government under Premier Don Getty set out to create a February holiday.

The third Monday in February was chosen, as it matched up with the American holiday of Presidents Day. And finally, all those American oil company executives in Calgary who donate a lot of money to the Progressive Conservative Party would stop complaining about how they had to work on Presidents Day.

But once again, the Conservatives ran into the problem of what to call this holiday. What should they celebrate? Well, it was around this time that scandal broke out in the Alberta government. Premier Getty's son was arrested on charges of dealing cocaine. Premier Getty reflected on this, and blamed himself. If he wasn't such a workaholic...if he spent more time with his family. Getty stood before the people of Alberta and said that if everybody took a day off once in a while to spend time with their families, then perhaps tragedies like these would be less likely.

And so, the holiday was called...Family Day.

The first Family Day was celebrated on February 19, 1990. But sadly, this holiday was not greeted with open arms. It met with considerable criticism from the Alberta business community. They argued that holidays are expensive things, what with the overtime pay that have to give to their employees, or lost revenue if they decide to close that day. So, to appease these special interests, the provincial government decided to downgrade Heritage Day (aka the August long weekend) to a civic holiday. This means that your company can make up for its lost Family Day revenues by making you work on the August long weekend.

In fact, there was so much opposition to Family Day in the beginning that one of Premier Ralph Klein's first election promises was to abolish Family Day. But by the time Klein finally came to power in 1992, Family Day has become firmly entrenched in the Alberta psyche, and people liked having that day off in February. Besides, which politician really wants their legacy to be the guy who cancels holidays? And now, as Family Day approaches its 20th anniversary, the idea has caught on so much that a great deal of Alberta businesses recognize both Family Day and Heritage Day.

Well, it still hasn't caught on with the federal government, which is why you'll still find the post office open today.

But Family Day is starting to grow in popularity. In 2006, Saskatchewan adopted Family Day as a holiday, and started celebrating in 2007. And then in 2007, Ontario adopted Family Day as a holiday, and began celebrating in 2008.

So, no matter where you find yourself today, be you at the Family Day pancake breakfast at your Legion hall, or building snowmen at your town's Family Day Winter Carnival, or just curled up on the couch watching a Family Day marathon on TV, I hope you'll take moment to raise your glass and drink to Premier Don Getty and his drug dealing son. For if it weren't for them, we would not be celebrating Family Day.

Well, we would probably still be celebrating a February holiday, it just wouldn't be called Family Day. Look at Manitoba. When they started celebrating a February holiday last year, they ditched the Family Day moniker and opted to call it Louis Riel Day.

So Alberta gets a day off because our premier felt guilty about his coke dealing son. Manitoba gets a day off to honour the founder of their province.

That's what we like to call the Alberta Advantage.

Latest Targ's Up!

Ah, it's funny how you think something that's NOT going to affect your life affects your life greatly. Take my upstairs neighbours for instance. When they first announced that the Mrs. was pregnant, they told me that I was to lead my life as normal, that I could be as loud and as noisy as I usually am. "We're not going to get used to the baby, the baby's going to get used to US!" they proudly told me.

The baby's around six months old now, and the baby's bedtime is 7PM. I know this, because every Saturday night at around 7:01PM, I get this phone call from upstairs:

"Yeah, we're having trouble getting the baby to sleep. Could you turn down your home theatre sound system, please?"

I tell ya, it's a real buzzkill to Movie Night.

So, on this particular movie night, I decided to shut things down and go ahead and post this week's episode of U62: The Targ a little early.

This week, it's Episode 2.21: Nuts in a Grocery Store. I give you an update on the new Batman movie, I offer my thoughts on the Olympic torch, and, as I like to do every year at this time, I tell the story of why we celebrate Family Day.

So, go give it a listen! And be sure to keep it turned down, so as not to wake the baby.

Click here to go download it!

Click here to subscribe in iTunes!

Flame On!

Let's hear it for Olympic symbols!

Today, there's just one year to go until the Winter Olympics come to Vancouver. So today, the unveiled what I'll be carrying when I'm selected to run in the Torch Relay. Yup, that sleek piece of silver in the picture is the Olympic torch.

It was designed and built by the great Canadian aeronautics firm Bombardier. The design was meant to be evocative of "the cool, crisp lines left in snow and ice from winter sports." It weighs in at 3.5 pounds, and was designed to be easy to carry, easy to hand off from one person to the next, and able to keep the Olympic flame burning in all kinds of weather.

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Also unveiled was the uniform that all the torchbearers get to wear in the torch relay. Like all the clothes for Team Canada in the Winter Olympics, it was designed and manufactured by the Hudson's Bay Company. And after looking it up online, yes, the torchbearers get to keep them. And they don't have to buy them.

I've got my name in to be a torchbearer! I'm going to look snazzy wearing that track suit and carrying the torch.

Here's the complete story.

Nolan's and Tarintino's Next

The good news: Christopher Nolan has decided what his next film will be!

The bad news: It's not a third Batman movie.

Nolan's next film is Inception. It's being described as "a contemporary sci-fi actioner based in the architecture of the mind." Nolan himself wrote the screenplay.

Now, does this mean that the third Batman movie won't be coming out in 2011 as planned? Well, let's not forget that there were just three years between Batman Begins and The Dark Knight, yet Nolan managed to squeeze The Prestige in between, so, there's always hope.

This'll be the first film that Nolan wrote and directed himself since his very first film, Knowing, which came out in 1998.

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For movie geeks of my generation, there's once sentence that stirs the blood: "Quentin Tarintino is making a new movie."

Tarintino's next is his long in development World War II epic Inglorious Basterds. It's due out in August, but Tarintino is rushing to finish it in time for the Cannes Film Festival in May.

The first trailer went online today. You'll be able to see it in theatres this Friday in front of the reboot of Friday the 13th.

TMNT DVD

FINALLY!

Ever since I first switched to DVD eight years ago, this is one film I've been praying to the DVD gods to get released as a super-mega-ultimate special edition. Granted, it's been out on a movie-only disc for a few years, but I want my super-mega-ultimate-special editions. That film is a true classic from my childhood. That film is....

the live action Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.

In fact, all four Ninja Turtle films (the three live action ones from the early 1990s and the computer animated one from two years ago) are gettting brand new, fully loaded 25th Anniversary Editions. They hit stores on August 2, and will be available on both DVD and Blu-Ray, if you've made the Great Upgrade.

25th Anniversary Editions? Yeah...the original Eastman and Laird indie comic that spawned the franchise first hit shelves in 1984. 2009 is the 25th anniversary of the Turtles.

Man, I suddenly feel old.

Movie Reviews: Coraline and Hulk vs.

First and foremost, I've got my complete review of Coraline posted. You can head on over to my main page to read it. Hell, you can even click here to go right to it.

Now, as might be a bit of a double-standard with me, while big-time theatrical films get posted in my movie reviews section, the straight-to-DVD films get reviewed just right here in the blog. So, then, let's get right down to a review of the latest straight-to-DVD film I picked up....

Hulk vs

Directed by Frank Paur and Sam Liu

Starring the voices of Fred Tatasciore, Bryce Johnson, Steve Blum, Matthew Wolf, Nolan North, March Acheson, Janyse Jaud, Colin Murdock, Tom Kane, Graham McTavish, Grey DeLisle and Kari Wahlgren.

Backstory: As I blogged when this first came out a few weeks ago, while the straight-to-DVD films of DC/Warner Brothers have been met with excitement, the straight-to-DVD films of Lionsgate/Marvel seem to be met with an indifferent shrug. I remember watching their first film, Ultimate Avengers, and being largely unimpressed. But that seems to be turning around with Hulk Vs. A bigger marketing push and some positive reviews piqued my interest. And then, when I saw it quite reasonably priced at Best Buy ($10 for the single-disc movie only version, $15 for the 2-disc special edition), I decided to succumb to my curiosity.

Plot: Again, as previously blogged, this film is made of 2 short films. The first one is Hulk vs. Wolverine. When the Hulk is spotted going on a destructive rampage along the US/Canadian border, the Canadian government dispatches Wolverine to investigate and neutralize the threat "with extreme prejudice." But it's not long before Wolverine's old Weapon X projects show up, wanting to capture the Hulk and make him the next Weapon X project. The second short is Hulk vs. Thor. In the mystical land of Asgard, the god Odin hibernates for a week once a year to replenish his energy. During this Odinsleep, Asgard is vulnerable, and the forces of darkness seek to overthrow the throne. And, the forces of evil are always defeated by the forces of good, led by Thor. However, the evil Loki has a dirty trick up his sleeve this time. Out of all the 9 worlds, there is one being who has ever been able to match Thor in battle: the Hulk. Loki transports Bruce Banner to Asgard, and uses magic to separate Bruce Banner and the Hulk into two separate beings. With a mindless Hulk let loose in Asgard, Thor and Loki are soon forced to join forces to defeat the mindless Hulk, lest this new threat bring about Ragnarok.

What I Liked: As I'm sure you've figured out, this pair of films holds a lot of "Hulk smash!" action. It gets violent, it gets bloody, it's all in there. Hulk vs. Thor is definitely the more plotty of the two, as the world of Asgard really gets top-notch treatment. And Deadpool is just plain funny. Oh, and the production values have really, really increased since Ultimate Avengers.

What I Didn't Like: Even though production values have increased, the animation is still nothing to write home about. And, almost like Godzilla movies, things seem to get really slow when there's no fighting going on.

Final Verdict: A fun little romp, if you like your Saturday morning cartoons with more blood and swears.

3 Nibs

Bonus Features: I got the 2-disc special edition, of course. Each short film gets its own "making of" featurette and a pair of running commentaries (commentary #1 with the writers, commentary #2 with the directors and animators). Exclusive to Hulk vs. Wolverine is a featurette about the screen of Hulk vs. Wolverine at last years San Diego Comic Con, and a featurette about the new cartoon Wolverine and the X-Men. Exclusive to Hulk vs. Thor is a featurette on the creation of Thor, and the trailer for Marvel/Lionsgate's next OVA, Thor: Tales of Asgard.

Latest Targ's Up!

Ah, Sunday Sunday!

As we do every Sunday, I've got a new episode of my podcast, U62: The Targ!

This week, Episode 2.20: The Other Half of the Battle. We're talking more Olympic merchandise, we recap my favourite Superbowl spots, and I begin my quest to get Watchmen read before the movie comes out!




Click here to find me on iTunes!

Click here to download it at Chaos in a Box.com!

Coraline off the cuff

Just got home from Coraline. Coraline was an odd bird for me...I've been tracing its development online since it was first announced 6 years ago. In that six years, I read the book a couple times. It was a good book.

And, it is a good movie. I always like it when my animated films throw something unexpected at me. In my favourite film, The Iron Giant, it's when our hero has to unzip his pants to let out a squirrel. In Ratatouille, it's when we get a quick glimpse of two lovers pointing guns at each, a shot goes off, they throw the guns aside, and being passionately kissing itself.

And in Coraline...it's naked, morbidly obese burlesque dancers.

It is a great film, if a tad predictable, but I chalk that up to having read the book a couple times.

And the soundtrack...my God. That's music that's going to haunt me for a while.

Fantastic film, check it out, I keep reading that it's better in 3D. I saw it in 2D myself, but if you have 3D theatre in your neighbourhood, 3D might be the way to go.

As always, a complete review at the main site in the next couple of days or so.

Hmmm...I never got around to writing that complete review of The Spirit, and that might be a good thing.

Something for adults, something for kids

Two stories in my wacky news that I feel like commenting on today....

First up, something for adults. Presenting the tale of Ms Sheyla Hershey. Hershey is on a quest to set a new world record. That record: the world's biggest breasts.

Back in May, she finished her 8th breast enhancement surgery. She has a gallon of silicone in each boob. Her bust size was a bra-busting 34FFF. But, that wasn't big enough. She wanted bigger. But, no plastic surgeon in the USA would go bigger, for fear of breaking the law. After her research, she found that there were no restrictions on how big you could go in Brazil.

She just got back from Brazil, where she got her 9th breast enhancement surgery, and now tips the scales with a 38KKK bra size.

Ya know, I'm a red blooded male and all that, but this...this just ain't right. One pundit said it best: those like beach balls that are about to pop.

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And now, for the kids.

Controversy out of Disneyland! The Disney folks have decided to refurbish their classic ride, It's a Small World. And, like all refurbishments to Disneyland rides, it's meeting with some resistance.

How have they changed it? Well, in addition to the animatronic children from all over the world, they've added some animatronic Disney characters! The classic song has not been spruced up to be included in a medley of Disney hits, plus they've added a farm scene, and a complete section dedicated to Toy Story.

The hardcore Disney fans are pissed about this...they say their messing with a classic. The Disney folks, however, insist that Walt Disney's vision was always one of growth and modification for the times.

Here's the original article, where you can read all about it!

Digital comes to Edmonton

Yay! Edmonton movie theatres are getting their first digital projector!

It was announced today that the Scotiabank Theatre in West Edmonton Mall (formerly known as Silver City, still best known as the one with the dragon in it) is installing a digital movie projector. The projector will also be capable of projecting films in Real D, which is the most popular 3D format going right now.

The digital projector will first be unleashed on Edmontonians with the released of the 3D Jonas Brothers concert film, coming out on February 27.

Here's hoping this October they get the 3D version of The Nightmare Before Christmas!

Here's the article!

Superbowl Spots!

Well, the Superbowl is always good for a movie geek like me, because so many summer blockbusters give us commercials in the Superbowl and kick off their advertising campaigns. And, based on the crop of commercials in this year's Superbowl, I think 2009 is going to be a great year for that genre known as "the event picture."

First up, one that I'm really looking forward to, one of my favourites from my childhood is on the big screen. It's the Real American Heroes themselves, G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra.






Speaking of childhood favourites, coming out just in time for my brithday this July, it's the Transformers sequel, Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen.






Big fat Trekkie that I am, perhaps the one that I'm most looking forward to is the re-boot of Star Trek.






I'm one of those guys who believes that Pixar can do no wrong, so I'm also counting down the days to Up:






And lastly, I was originally indifferent towards this one, but this spot has me hooked. Will Ferrel brings us the new movie version of the beloved 1970s adventure show, Land of the Lost:

Latest Targ's Up!

If y'all can tear yourselves away from today's big Superbowl extravaganza, how about you give a listen to this week's podcast, U62: The Targ?

This week, it's Episode 2.19: Beatles & Sunshine. I threw my name into the hat to be in the Olympic torch relay, so I'll tell you all about that. I rant about the upcoming scents of Star Trek cologne, and I even get into some subject matter that's NSFW. (I'll give you a hint: it involves Star Wars pron.)

So, please! Go check out this week's episode of U62: The Targ.

Click here to download it from my website!

Click here to subscribe in iTunes!

Smells Like Star Trek / The He-Man Movie is Coming!

So I'm doing some perusing at the glut of Star Trek merch that's about to hit store shelves in anticipation of the new movie.

They're actually going to be making Star Trek cologne.

There's going to be three scents in the line: "Tiberius," "Pon Farr," and "Red Shirt."

For those who aren't trekkies, let me explain the significance of those three names.

Tiberius - That's the T in James T. Kirk. Make yourself smell like the galaxy's foremost ladie's man. Cool...cool.

Pon Farr - That's the mating frenzy that Vulcan males go into every 7 years. Yeah, baby. A scent that'll drive the women into a mating frenzy! There's our #1 seller.

Red Shirt - The Starfleet security guards were always the first to die on away teams, and were known for their red shirts. To be a red shirt is die quickly. Yeah...a cologne that's the stench of death. That's the way to go.

They should be on the store shelves later this spring.

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Wow...just a few months ago, the new, live-action Masters of the Universe was considered dead.

But today, they hired a director!

The director is John Stevenson, an animator who's last project was the hit Dreamworks film Kung Fu Panda.

Stevenson said what sold him on the job was when he paid a visit to Mattel and they took him to this room where the toy designers had already pumped out pages and pages of concept art for the film. Stevenson says he took one look at the artwork and "understood the mythology right away."

What really gives me hope for this film is the fact that the producer is Joel Silver. Silver is the Hollywood uber-producer who brought us the Die Hard franchise, the Lethal Weapon franchise, and various other action films. Oh, and he also made the Wachowski Brothers stars by helping them realize The Matrix Trilogy and Speed Racer.

Tomb Raider Returns?

Just saw a bit of movie news this morning that caught my eye.

Warner Brothers has just picked up the movie rights to the Tomb Raider franchise, and is planning a reboot of the feature film franchise.

The history: Paramount had the movie rights, pumped out two movies, and then, faced with the diminishing returns, let the movies lapse.

I remember the first film being the one summer blockbuster that I was most anticipating as summer 2001 rolled around, and I remember the film being rather mediocre. And then I saw the sequel two years later and that one made me want to gouge my eyes out.

Although, it is funny. You never know who pops up in these films. I saw a bit of the first one of Peachtree TV the other day, and I forgot that Lara Croft's rival is played by a "before-he-was-Bond" Daniel Craig. The next day, the second one was on, and Lara Croft's partner/love interest was King Leonidas himself, Gerard Butler.

No word yet on writer, directors, stars, or a release date. One thing's for sure: Angelina Jolie is not expected to return to the role of Lara Croft. Apparently, Warner Brothers thinks that, now that Jolie is a multiple Oscar nominee, she's out of their league.

New DVD Tuesday!

Ah, Tuesday, the day of the new DVDs. There's a couple of releases out today that I feel are worth noting.

With the explosion of popularity of DVDs, so has exploded the medium of straight-to-DVD animation. Both of the major comic book companies have gotten on board. And while DC Comics and Warner Brothers have released a series of straight-to-DVD films to critical acclaim, the Lionsgate/Marvel Comics films have been met with a resounding shrug of indifference. That seems to turn around today with the release of Hulk Vs.

Hulk Vs is actually two short films. The first one is Hulk vs. Wolverine. Taking it's cues from Wolverine's first appearance in Incredible Hulk #181, it starts off with the Hulk wreaking havoc along the Canadian/American border, so the Canadian government dispatches Wolverine to investigate. And Wolverine and Hulk fight.

The second short film is Hulk vs. Thor. Loki figures that he's finally found away to defeat his brother Thor and rule of all Asgard. He lets the Hulk loose in Asgard to tear the place down. And Hulk and Thor fight.

The 2-disc set is fully loaded. Each short film boasts a pair of running commentaries and it's own featurette as to its production. You also get trailers for the new X-Men toon and Marvel's next straight-to-DVD animation project, Thor: Tales of Asgard.

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Also out on DVD today in the "Oh my God, I can't believe they released this" file is M.A.N.T.I.S.: The Complete Series. This superhero show came to us in the early 1990s. It was the brainchild of Sam Raimi, who went on to give us the Spider-Man films, and Sam Hamm, who gave us Tim Burton's first Batman.

The entire thing was a not-too-bad Iron Man clone. Billionaire scientist Miles Hawkins is shot in the back while trying to deliver aid in the middle of riot, and is paralyzed from the waist down. Using his company's resources, he develops for himself an exosuit that allows him to walk again. Using the suit's power, he sets out as a crimefighter.

Carl Lumbly, whom you may remember as Marcus Dixon on Alias, played Miles Hawkins/MANTIS. Roger Rees, still probably best remembered as Robin Colcord on Cheers, played John Stonebreak, Hawkin's best friend, colleague, confidant, and gadget-meister. Let's see...there was also a bike courier and a plucky female police detective who served as his agents. They mostly battled evil industrialist Solomon Box, who was played by Andrew Robinson, still best known to my fellow Trekkies as Garak.

Well, they started out battling Solomon Box. Then, under orders from the FOX network to make the show more like The X-Files, MANTIS started battling more paranormal advisaries, such as invaders from parallel universes. MANTIS met his end in the final episode, when he was eaten by an invisible dinosaur.

And the complete series is out today! There's absolutly nothing for bonus features.

Latest Targ's Up!

It's that time of the week again!

We've got a new episode of my little ol' podcast, U62: The Targ!

This week, it's Episode 2.18: A Typical Saturday Night. Nothin' but Star Trek, He-Man and bad jokes!




Click here to find me on iTunes!

Click here to download it at Chaos in a Box.com!

Oscar Nominations

Yay! Oscar nominations were announced today. As has become an annual tradition of mine, let's take a quick look at the nominations in MY favourite categories, because everyone's going to be all obsessed with the big categories.

First up, perhaps the biggest of my favourite categories, Best Animated Film. The nominees are:

WALL-E
Kung Fu Panda
Bolt

My Prediction: No doubt, WALL-E. I think it still stands as one of the best reviewed films of the year, plus Pixar is becoming an Oscar favourite.

On the radio today, I said that I've been able to successfully predict this category ever since its inception. He wants to do some kind of wager on the air now. I'm game, seeing as to how WALL-E will win hands down.

Next up, we have Best Visual Effects. I've always had a pretty successful run of predictions in this category as well. The nominees are:

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Iron Man
The Dark Knight

This is a tough one for me. I've heard good things about the effects work in Benjamin Button. Apparently, turning Brad Pitt into a computer animated, 90-year-old lookin' baby is quite the FX work. So, I'm going to go with Benjamin Button.

Finally, we've got Best Original Song. This is a holdover from the old days. In the 1990s, you could always successfully predict this one with the rule, "It'll be the one from the Disney animated film." But Disney hasn't done a lot of animated musicals lately. So, let's see what we've got....

"Down to Earth" from WALL-E
"Jai Ho" from Slumdog Millionaire
"O Saya," also from Slumdog Millionaire.

Hmmm...what to predict? Oh, er, um, uh...it'll be the one from the Disney/Pixar animated film! "Down to Earth" it is!

The big show is on February 21. The host is Wolverine himself, Hugh Jackman.

Here's the complete list of nominees.

The Princess and the Frog

This picture went online on Friday, and the more I stare at it, the more I fall in love with it.


As this decade began, Disney took a look at their books. While their traditional, hand-drawn animated movies were still doing well, computer animated movies were doing far, far better. Making more money. So, the conclusion that Disney drew from this was that people didn't want to watch traditional, hand-drawn animated movies anymore. Peoople only wanted computer animated movies. So, around 5 years ago or so, in a highly controversial move (among animation buffs), Disney shut down their traditional animation division.

So then, around two years ago, it was the great Disney/Pixar merger. Pixar, the makers of the finest computer animated films out there, merged with Disney. As part of the merger, John Lassetter, the head of Pixar, because the big boss of Disney animation. Lassetter was one of those who thought that shutting down the traditional animation division was a bad idea, and now, he was in a position to do something about it.

So, Lassetter got the traditional animation division up and running again. He enlisted his old friends John Musker and Ron Clemmens to direct Disney's first movie from the resurrected traditional animation division. Musker and Clemmens were at the forefront of Disney's resurgance in the 1990s, being the duo responsible for The Little Mermaid, Aladdin, and Hercules.

Musker and Clemmens came up with The Princess and the Frog, a re-telling of The Frog Prince. This time, the setting has been moved to New Orleans, and it draws its mysticism from Cajun folklore.

This image from the film was released on Friday, and doesn't it just remind you of the old days?



And by "the old days," I mean the 1990s, when a new Disney animated film was always a highlight of the summer blockbuster season.

The Princess and the Frog has officially been given a release date of Christmas Day 2009.

And I forget if I blogged this already, but here's the teaser trailer, which went into theatres in front of Bolt:

Latest Targ's Up!

Are you ready for some hot, sweaty, podcast action?

Well, it's not so much "hot and sweaty" as it is "lukewarm and comfortable."

This week's episode of U62: The Targ is Episode 2.17: Dirty Habits. If you read that blog entry from a couple of days ago, then you know what I'm talking about. I'm playing some cuts from my brand new Doctor Who and Pushing Daisies soundtracks, and just generally geeking out over how good those shows are.




Click here to find me on iTunes!

Or, if you don't have the iTunes click here to go to the official website!

Dirty Habits

Oh, I've been indulging in my dirty habits a little too much as of late. This dirty habit is the collecting of obscure film scores.

Only recently, am I starting to discover all these record labels in the USA that specialize in releasing obscure film scores. The other day, I discovered one of them had released a score album for Batman: The Animated Series. I dipped deep into my savings to get it. In my opinion, Shirley Walker and her team of composers composed the most appropriate music for Batman ever. I can hardly wait until it gets here.

And of course, once I filled out that order, I checked my mailbox to see that the other obscure film scores I'd ordered had arrived.

I've blogged many times about my love for Pushing Daisies, so I had to snatch up that score album when it was released a few weeks ago. That is a great album. It's such perfect fairy-tale music. I'm going to have it running on an endless loop for a while.

And curse you, Amazon.ca! I placed my order for the Pushing Daisies score, and up popped the little notice, "Spend $10 more for free shipping!" So I special ordered the Doctor Who soundtrack. This soundtrack is just for series 1 and 2...I see a seperate soundtrack for series 3 is also available, and one for series 4 is out at the end of the month.

Gotta buy them all!

And speaking of buying them all, we have a release date for the eleventh Pokemon movie! Pokemon: Giratina and the Sky Warrior hits DVD shelves on February 27.

I've got to make due on my promise to watch all of the films and review them here on the blog...I think I'll do it as soon as #11 comes out.

My Newest YouTube Epic: A Zamboni Clearing the Ice

One of my favourite cartoons from my carefree college years was Freakazoid!. One episode in particular that stands out was called Relax-o-Vision. The joke was this: kids were getting too hyper from watching violent action scenes, so Freakazoid! became the first cartoon presented in Relax-o-Vision. Everytime a violent act broke out, we'd cut to a relaxing of scene, of, say, fish in an aquarium, while soothing music played.

That episode kind of served as the inspiration for my latest YouTube opus, A Zamboni Clearing the Ice. What can I say? It's a relaxing scene, set to soothing music.





And yes, the pop-ups at the end are true. I actually do have a 4 minute director's cut of this. It's actually more like a rough cut, as I threw in a longer song and put in every frame of footage I filmed, until I started editing it down to reflect my true intent.

If there's rampant interest in the director's cut, I'll post it. Eh, I'll probably post it anyway, cuz I like the music I use in the director's cut.

Zack and Miri on DVD! (and more Andy Richter!)

OK, good news for me! Still being a Kevin Smith fanboy, I am very thrilled to hear about the forthcoming DVD release of Zack and Miri Make a Porno!

Zack and Miri will be hitting store shelves on February 3, and be available in a 2-disc special edition. Bonus features include deleted scenes, a feature-length documentary on the making of the film, the Money Shots video production diary, and a blooper reel.

Sadly, this is the first Kevin Smith film that does not have a running commentary by Smith. Smith has been hinting that he may record one later and release it as a podcast. Or, if you make the great upgrade to Blu-Ray, you'll be able to download it on your Blu-Ray player and sync it up!

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And we have more details on yesterday's announcement on the release of Andy Richter Controls the Universe: The Complete Series. I said the bonus features were TBA, and today they announced them!

For bonus features, you're going to get a handful of featurettes, and running commentaries on select episodes with series creator Victor Fresco, and the man himself, Andy Richter.

March 24!

Andy Richter Controls DVDs / Dead Like Me Resurrected?

Well, the short list of brilliant but canceled TV shows I want on DVD has just gotten a little shorter!

It was announced today that Andy Richter Controls the Universe is finally coming to DVD!

For those who don't know, Andy Richter Controls the Universe was the first of Andy Richer's three failed sitcoms. In this one, Andy played a struggling writer who paid the bills by writing tech manuals for a faceless corporation. His overactive imagination frequently allowed him to daydream how his day would have turned out if he'd made a different decision. As I reflect on it, it was a lot like Scrubs, only in an office instead of a hospital and Andy Richter instead of Zack Braff.

Anyway, it was funny as hell, but barely lasted two seasons. And today, Paramount Pictures announced that they are releasing Andy Richter Controls the Universe: The Complete Series on March 24! All 19 episodes, bonus features TBA.

Now if they'd just release Now and Again, my life would be complete.

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Hey, we got any Dead Like Me fans reading the blog? That's another "brilliant but canceled" TV show I always wanted to check out, but never got to.

I really want to check it out because it was created by Bryan Fuller, who created two of my other favourite "brilliant but canceled" TV shows, Wonderfalls and the recently deceased Pushing Daisies. But I'm straying off topic.

They've actually produced a Dead Like Me straight-to-DVD movie. It's called Dead Like Me: Life After Death and is due to hit your local DVD emporium on February 17.

A Whole Lotta TV

Wow. I have a whole lotta TV to watch. I've amassed a bunch of dead TV shows on DVD over the past few weeks.

First up, once again, special thanks to my best friend, who got me He-Man and the Masters of the Universe. He got me Season 1: Volume 2, Season 2: Volume 2, and an apology for getting me the back end of each season. But still, it's really cool.

When I first fired it up, I was completely stunned. Watching it on my DVD player, hooked up to my massive TV with component video cables, it is a far cry from when I originally watched these episodes on my parents old 12" colour TV on peasant vision in my childhood. I just can't get over how clear and sharp it is...I've never seen the show this clearly.

He-Man was a really odd cartoon now that I'm sitting down and watching it for the first time in all these years. It was such a unique blend of sci-fi, fantasy, and superhero. What really makes it unique is the brand of fantasy that it drew from is the pulp-fiction, sword-and-sorcery kind that was really popular in the 30's and 40's. Well, that actually shouldn't be too surprising. We have to remember He-Man was created when that brand of fantasy was experiencing a resurgence, thanks to the success of Conan the Barbarian.

I'll probably have more musings on He-Man in the days ahead.

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I also finally broke down and bought Pushing Daisies: The Complete First Season. Oh, woe that the show has been canceled! No word yet on when the final three episodes will air...rumour has it in the summer.

And creator Bryan Fuller has said that it may not end, and he's thought about continuing the series as a comic book. In a recent interview, Fuller said that he's currently in meetings with DC Comics about the comic book and that he's also putting together a movie pitch. The comic would be good...I could see it being a nice, quirky addition to DC's Vertigo label. And here's hoping that the sales of the DVDs are strong enough that it does lead to a movie...it'd be really nice if it were the next Firefly/Serenity.

And we already have a celebrity director who could do the movie! As we all know, it's quite common these days for a TV show to line up a celebrity director to film the pilot, maybe a couple episodes in the first season, and then sign on as an executive producer for the show's run. The most successful such collaboration so far has been Bryan Singer and House. Well, Pushing Daisies had it's celebrity director in the form of Barry Sonnenfeld.

Ah, Barry Sonnenfeld...that's a celebrity director who's due for a comeback. He proved he had what it took to do big blockbusters by bringing us The Addams Family films and the Men in Black films. He showed he could win over the critics by doing Get Shorty. Then he made Wild Wild West, which was the cinematic equivalent of shooting himself in the foot.

Sonnenfeld has actually been associated with a lot of "brilliant but canceled" TV. He was responsible for that remake of Fantasy Island in the late-1990s, and he also brought us the live-action version of The Tick.

Come on, Sonnenfeld! You turn your career around! Why not do it with a Pushing Daisies film? A fanboy can dream, can't he?

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And finally, while I was doing my Christmas shopping, I finally spied Space: Above and Beyond -- The Complete Series in a discount bin, so I snatched it up. Simply a fantastic sci-fi/war show from the mid-90s, I loved it when I was in that netherworld between high school and college.

Again, it had some great talent behind the scenes. It was created by Glen Morgan and James Wong, who, at the time, were the greatest writers on The X-Files. Their most notable achievment on The X-Files is they are the accredited creators of the characters of the Lone Gunmen. Their fame on X-Files led them to create their own show, which was Space: Above and Beyond. When that joined the heap of brilliant-but-canceled TV, X-Files creator Chris Carter talked them into being the showrunners on his other show Millenium.

And what are Morgan and Wong up to now? The Final Destination franchise and occasional remakes of 1970s horror films.

Here's a thought: I always thought Space: Above and Beyond should be resurrected as a film franchise. How about it, Morgan and Wong?

All in all, I've got a lot of TV to watch.

Latest Targ's Up!

Are you all jazzed for the first new Targ of 2009? Are you? ARE YOU?

Good to hear!

To kick off the final year of the first decade of the 21st Century, I've got Episode 2.16: Reflections. I reflect on the Christmas that just was, my best friend's wedding, and a quirk of Japanese culture I never partook in.

Head on over to the main site and give it a listen!



Or, you can click on that button above and go subscribe to the Targ in iTunes.

G.I. Joe and the Transformers: Summer 2009

Ah, two of the classics from my childhood are coming to the big screen this summer, and I can hardly wait!

First up, Michael Bay is back in the director's seat for the gigantic Transformers sequel, Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen. No word yet on the plot, we're just promised that it's going to be huge, gigantic, epic, and just bigger than the first.

Here's the teaser poster that went online today. The first trailer is expected at the end of the month, along with the SuperBowl.



Notice how it looks vaguely like the Decepticon logo from the eyes up? Nice touch.

And, coming in August, we have the live-action movie version of G.I. Joe. This one comes to us from Stephen Sommers.

G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra will detail the origins of America's daring, highly-trained special missions force, and the terrorist organization that is its arch-enemy.

The official website was launched yesterday. There's nothing there yet but the logo. Again, we're expecting the first trailer at the end of the month with the SuperBowl. Although, there have been scattered reports that the trailer has already been shown in some markets and that it's...not very good.

We'll know for sure come the SuperBowl!

Iron Man 2 Updates

Some news is going around today on Iron Man 2. And that news is...we have villains!

Sam Rockwell and Mickey Rourke will be doing battle with Tony Stark.

Rockwell is still best remembered to my fellow nerds for playing Zaphod Beeblebrox in the big screen version of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, and is currently winning critical acclaim for his role in Frost/Nixon as investigator James Reston Jr. In Iron Man 2, Rockwell will be playing Justin Hammer, one of Tony Stark's rival industrialists who funds a lot of supervillains.

Rourke is on a career high right now, having impressed comic book nerds with his turn as Marv in Sin City, and he's currently being touted as an Oscar hopeful for his role in The Wrestler. There's still some debate on which Iron Man villian Rourke will be playing. Some say he'll be playing Whiplash, a mercenary armed with electric whips. Others say he'll be playing the Crimson Dynamo, a Russian mercenary with his own set of super-powered armor.

Iron Man 2 is still on track for a May 2010 release. Jon Favreau is back as the director, Robert Downey Jr. and Gwynyth Paltrow are both back as Tony Stark and Pepper Pots, and Don Cheadle takes over for Terrance Howard as Jim Rhodes.

My New Movie...Coming Soon

I enjoy walking. It's one of the few physical activities I make an effort to get out and do. Well, all physical activities require effort.... You know what I'm getting at.

Given my job, when I'm out on the streets of Athabasca, I'm occasionally stopped and mocked for listening to my MP3 player while I'm walking. "Don't you listen to the radio enough when you're at work?" they ask me.

And then I started goofing around with my YouTube videos and things started coming together.

So, for a while now, I've had this idea for a YouTube video called Walking. It would just feature footage filmed by me, walking down some of my favourite walking trails in and around Athabasca, with a soundtrack consisting of the music I'm usually listening to when I walk down that path.

While I was home for Christmas vacation, sitting around the house, I was hit with an inspiration.

As the snow started falling, I grabbed my camera, and filmed a short bit of me walking down the back alley. Then, I threw it together into this proof of concept/test footage/trailer thing.

So, here is...Walking: Test Footage.

That's Good Eats!

I've always been amazed at how something in one culture gets re-interpreted into another culture. The past few days, I've been immersed in it.

I've been watching two shows by Gordon Ramsay. Well, actually, the same show, just one produced in the UK and one produced in the USA.

For those who don't know, Ramsay is one of the top professional chefs in the world. He's most famous for his reality TV show Hell's Kitchen, in which chefs compete for a job in one of his restaurants. But I've been immersed in his other show, Kitchen Nightmares. In this one, Ramsay heads to a restaurant that's in dire straights...on the verge of closing down for good. Ramsay then gives himself one week to diagnose the restaurant's problems and then solve them. On New Years Eve, BBC Canada was having a marathon of the original British version, and on New Years Day, the Food Network was having a marathon of the American version. I tend to avoid reality TV, but this 2-day marathon got me hooked.

I found the original British version to be more low-key. It's done more in a documentary style, and there's more focus on the restaurants themselves and what Ramsay has to go through to turn things around.

However, on the American version, all the cliches that we've come to associate with reality TV are in full swing. The dramatic music that's been recycled since Who Wants to be a Millionaire...talking-to-the-camera confessionals...extremely heavy editing to play up the drama. And the focus isn't so much on the restaurant as it is on squabbling owners and bickering staff members.

I will admit, the original British version does have something neat that the American verison lacks. And that is, in the original British version, each one has an epilogue where Ramsay pays a surprise visit to the restaurant about a month after his makeover to see if they've been able to follow his advice and turn things around.

But yeah. I do have to agree with the critics. Part of the appeal is that, in most reality TV shows, the host is the same, uncaring, variation on a game show host. But in Ramsay's shows, he seems to genuinely care about turning these restaurants around, making them successful and helping these people.

Reminds me of another example. American reality TV shows really live by the addage that "conflict is at the heart of great drama," and that they always try to amp up the agression.

Another reality TV show I was hooked on 7 years ago or so was Junkyard Wars, but all the true geeks refer to it by its original British name, Scrapheap Challenge. The contest: two teams have from sun-up to sundown to build a machine of some sort, and all the parts are scavanged from a specially-stocked junkyard. The next day, their machine has to accomplish a set list of goals. If their machine actually accomplishes the goals, that team wins. Yay, team!

I remember watching the original British version. The task was to build a harvesting machine of some kind. Sitting in the junkyard was an old swather, which I'm sure you'll agree was quite a coveted piece of junk in this challenge. Team A and Team B stumbled across the swather at the same time. Team A needed Part X, and Team B needed Part Y. So the two teams joined together, helped each other grab the parts they needed, shook hands, wished each other luck, and went back to working on their machines.

A year or so later, I was watching the American version. Exact same set-up. Building a harvester...old swather in the junkyard...the two teams each needed a part off it, and discovered it at the same time. Well, Team A and Team B descended into a screaming match over who "owned" this swather. The judges had to decend into the junkyard to make sure it didn't come to blows. After hearing each team's argument, the judges ruled that Team B owned the swather. Team B got their parts, and Team A had to head back into the junkyard to find a suitable replacement.

Everything about reality TV has to be about the agression, which is kind of what turns me off.

It Begins Again

So, here we are, the start of 2009. As I do on every New Years Day, I'm sitting here, sipping the last of the eggnog from my Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring collector's glass from Burger King (best fast food promotion EVER) and reflecting on the year that was.

2008 was monumental in one big way. I finally achieved a goal I set out to accomplish in 2003. 5 years of schooling, hard work, and waiting for the right opportunity finally all came together.

In 2008, I finally achieved my dream of becoming a radio announcer.

It was a difficult road...one that proved to be a lot tougher than when I first enrolled in NAIT back in 2003. Especially when most of my classmates were hired fresh out of school and it took me a year of begging and pleading to even get my foot in the door. But I eventually got my way in, worked my way up, and back in April, the company gave me a shot at the big chair.

From that point on, I kind of resolved to take things easy for the rest of 2008. The best analogy I could come up with was the end of Finding Nemo. I was just a fish in the ocean, bobbing up and down, trying to figure out where to go next.

And that is the trick, isn't it? Where do I go from here? So many things I can do, so many things I could do. What will get done?

I've always kind of frowned upon setting goals and working towards them. The problem I always had with goal-setting was that I always, always, always find some way to choke at the finish line. So rather than set goals, I find it's better to have a vaguely defined objective and see what kind of damage you can do while stumbling forward. I learned a long time ago that no expectations means no disappointment.

But still, I have this desire to do something...accomplish something. Will 2009 finally be the year I write that novel? Will I finally buy a bike and take up cycling again? Who knows? It's a new year, filled with all kinds of new possibilities.

And a new Quentin Tarintino movie, Inglorious Bastards, coming out on August 21. Sorry, just had to mention that.

Anyway, while I contemplate what the future may bring, it's time to sit back, and do the completely made-up New Years tradition I started a few years ago. I'm going to watch Titanic.

Hello? Is anybody out there?

I was watching that classic episode of Corner Gas last night where people get sick and tired of hearing Hank's ramblings, so they tell Hank to start writing them down in a blog. But then of course, no one reads Hank's blog, so Hank gets all upset. And then Brent, the only one who actually reads Hank's blog, starts writing up "Hank's blog cheat sheets" for everyone, so people can pretend they're reading Hank's blog and not upset Hank. Then, because he gets sick of everyone asking him for the cheat sheets, Brent starts posting the cheat sheets online, thus inspiring him to start his own blog. But then, no one reads Brent's blog, so Hank and Brent just start talking to each other.

Anyway, that led me to believe that the millions of people who don't read this blog are probably not wondering where I went.

Nothing spectacular, I'm still off on Christmas vacation. I'm trying to spend as much of it off the grid as possible...no blogging, no Facebook, and most importantly, no checking company e-mail and fretting about how the office is surviving without me.

But still, I'm getting bored as hell, so it's time to check in on things.

Over here, we have the latest "final nail in the coffin" for VHS. Back on Boxing Day, the last remaining distributor of video tapes in the USA closed its doors. That means no more new videos will be popping up in discount bins all across the USA.

Other "final nails" include the last video tape being put out by a major Hollywood studio (that was A History of Violence, back in '06) and JVC, the electronics company that first started selling VCR's, announcing that they are discontinuing the manufacture of VCR's.

And, if that weren't enough, the experts are saying that DVD will have gone the way of VHS inside of four years, to be replaced by Blu-Ray.

In other news, I managed to hit the city and see The Spirit. Yeah...um...well, it is a movie.

As we all know, it was the first effort from comic book legend Frank Miller, and he's still figuring out things like "editing." Some things really feel disjointed, some scenes run on too long and its, well, really something else.

At the theatre where I saw it, around halfway through the film, a young man screamed out "THIS MOVIE'S FUCKIN' GAY!" and stormed out of the theatre.

While I would not describe the movie as "FUCKIN' GAY!", it definitly is not quite up to par.

Miller has already announced that his next film will be an adaptation of the classic pulp fiction hero Buck Rogers, so lets hope he learns from his mistakes.

A Few More Trailers

Don't you hate it when you have trouble sleeping and eventually you think, "Screw it, I'll just get up early?" I'm having one of those mornings. Since I am up early, I'm wasting some time watching some movie trailers online and just catching up on what's going on in the world of animated movies.

First up, we've got the new trailer for Dreamworks' latest animated opus, Monsters vs. Aliens. The title pretty much describes it all. When aliens invade the earth, the government decides to unleash an army of monsters to battle the aliens.

The monsters are led by Susan Murphy, aka Ginormica, who's hit by a meteorite on her wedding day, causing her to grow to 49.75 feet tall. (There's a joke in there as to why she's no 50 feet tall, but I've forgotten it.) She's voiced by Reese Witherspoon. The other monsters are the Missing Link, voice by Will Arnet (GOB on Arrested Development). Dr. Cockroach, Ph.D., a mad scientist with the head of a cockraoch. He's voice by Hugh Laurie, House on House. And B.O.B., a blue gelatinous blob voiced by Seth Rogan.

Other characters include the general who collected the monsters, W.R. Monger, voiced by Keifer Sutherland, and the President of the USA, voiced by Stephen Colbert.

Now, I'm usually pretty cynical towards Dreamworks films, as they popularized the "talking animals making fart jokes" formula that is currently dominating animated films. However, I'll root for anything that's not "talking animals making fart jokes," so this one may be worth a look.





Speaking of rooting for anything that's not "talking animals making fart jokes," next up is 9. Based on the Acadamey Award nominated short film of the same name, 9 is about sentient rag dolls in a post-apocolyptic world trying to redeem humanity. Think of this as WALL-E's Goth brother.

Written and directed by Shane Acker, who wrote and directed the original short film, and produced by Tim Burton, 9 features the voices of Eijah Wood, Jennifer Connelly, John C. Riley, Martin Landau, and Christopher Plummer.





Oh, and here's the original film on YouTube, in case you want a greater taste of what you're in for.

Latest Targ's Up!

Another Sunday, means another episode of The Targ!

This week, we've got Episode 2.15: An Adult Christmas, in which I lament what Christmas now means to me, seeing as to how I'm a responsible adult and all that. We also talk about which of Time Magazine's buzzwords of 2008 started in Canada, and Sunshine Girls! Yay, Sunshine Girls!

So please, head on over to the main site and give it a listen!



Or, you can click on that button above and go subscribe to the Targ in iTunes.

I should also mention that The Targ is going to be gone for the next couple of weeks...going away on Christmas vacation, and will be far away from all my recording dohickeys.

And now, if you'll excuse me, I see it's -40 in Athabasca this morning, so it's time to play another exciting game of "Will my car start?" Even with my car plugged in, she just refuses to start on one morning in the winter when we hit -40. Is today the morning? We'll see....

My Christmas Scrapbook

Ladies and gentlemen, Christmas can mean only one thing...Christmas movies!

So here's my latest YouTube endeavour. My Christmas Scrapbook follows me as I go around to a couple of Athabasca Christmastime events, and chronicle my adventures.





Not gonna lie...I'm a little disappointed with this one. Because I tried to smoosh the two events into one film, the whole project just never really gelled. As Lucas tells us, films aren't released, they escape. And this one got away on me.

Damn it! I never finished that thought in the intro...one of the many reasons why I'm not pleased. Oh, well. That's why Lucas invented special editions.

Good News/Bad News

First, the good news.

It was announced today that Tim Robbins has joined the cast of Iron Man 2!

Robbins will be playing Howard Stark, the father of Tony Stark, in flashbacks. Director Jon Favreau says that Howard Stark plays a very integral role in the plot, and in setting up the forthcoming Avengers film, which is why he wanted a really, really good actor.

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And now, the bad news.

Majel Barrett passed away today.

I blogged about her just last week. The widow of Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry, Barrett had numerous roles in all of Star Trek. She was the nameless first office Number One in the original pilot The Cage...she was Dr. McCoy's head nurse Christine Chapel on The Original Series...and she played Deanna Troi's mother Lwaxana on The Next Generation. She also voice the Enterprise computer in every series.

Barrett had been battling leukemia for the past few years. She was 76.

Last week, it was announced that Barrett would be reprising her role as the voice of the Enterprise computer in the new Star Trek movie due out in May. It has been learned that, yes, she did finish voicing the computer.

Wolverine Trailer!

So, if you listened to this week's podcast, then you probably heard my rant about prequels...which leads into this latest trailer.

Once upon a time, a long time ago, a friend of mine told me that the popular fanboy musings for adapting X-Men to the silver screen would be to start off with a Wolverine solo film, which would end with Wolverine joining the X-Men. And then, you make X-Men.

Well, in this day and age, the popular way is to do things backwards, which meant the Wolverine film would be saved for a prequel.

And it's here!

X-Men Origins: Wolverine hits theatres on May 1, and it tells the tale of Wolverine...his childhood in Alberta...his time serving in the wars...his fateful recruitment into the Weapon X project. Hugh Jackman has gone on record as reminding us that, when we first meet Wolverine in the first X-Men film, he's cage-fighting in a bar in northern Alberta. Says Jackman, the end of this prequel, you'll be able to believe that Wolverine walked out of the wilderness and into that bar.

In addition to Jackman back as Wolverine one more time, Liev Schreiber takes over as Wolverine's arch-enemy Sabertooth, Danny Houston is the young General William Stryker, Lynn Collins is Wolverine's one-time love Silver Fox, Ryan Reynolds is his Weapon X teammate Deadpool, and Taylor Kitsch plays the one X-Man that people have been clamouring to see, Gambit.

Gavin Hood, still best known for the South African drama Tsotsi directs.

May 1 is when it hits theatres.

Howard finally comes to DVD

I have fantastic news for all you Marvel zombies and George Lucas apologists!

Howard the Duck is finally coming to DVD!

For those who have blocked it from your mind, Howard the Duck was based on the Marvel comic of the same name, about a walking, talking duck who is stranded on Earth. The movie turned it into a sci-fi epic, with Howard battling giant, stop-motion animated scorpions set to invade the Earth. Jeffery Jones played the evil scientists possessed by the boss scorpion, Lea Thompson was his hot, human girlfriend, and Tim Robbins was the nerdy scientist who helped them out.

It was written and directed by Willard Huyck, a longtime George Lucas collaberator who wrote American Graffiti and Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. It was produced by George Lucas's Lucasfilm.

Howard the Duck was a gigantic bomb, reviled by critics, and is often regarded as the worst thing that George Lucas had his name attached to. Yes, even worse than the prequels.

But it's finally coming to DVD on March 10!

Bonus features include a half-a-dozen featurettes about the making of the film. And yes, they got the involvement of George Lucas and Willard Huyck and Stan Lee.

Suggested retail price is $14.98, meaning it's going straight to discount bins.

Latest Targ's Up!

Wow. What is it about me? 5:30AM on Sunday morning, and here I am, up before the Sun.

The plus thing is, you get a new episode of The Targ way, way early!

Today, it's Episode 2.14: Antecedent Action, wherein I talk about prequels, Anne of Green Gables, and Wayne and Shuster. Yup, I'm hitting my CanCon with this one!

So head on over to the Targ and download this week's episode!

And don't forget to subscribe in iTunes!

It's the little things....

So, there was an announcement today on the new Star Trek movie that made the trekkies go, "Hey...I never thought of that! But JJ Abrams did, and it was a smart move!" And that decision is....

Majel Barrett will be reprising her role as the voice of the Enterprise's computer!

Barrett, of course, has done the voice of the ship's computer in every incarnation of Star Trek...except Enterprise, which took place before they had talking computers. But thanks to time-travel wackiness, she got to voice the computer in a couple of episodes.

In addition, she played the nameless first officer Number One in the original pilot, "The Cage." She played Dr. McCoy's head nurse, Christine Chapel, on the original series, and she played Lwaxana Troi, Councillor Troi's mother, on The Next Generation and a couple episodes of Deep Space Nine.

Another interesting fact...she did the voices of darn near every female guest star on the animated Star Trek series!

Plus, she was the wife of Star Trek's creator, Gene Roddenberry.

Terminator: Salvation Trailer

Ah, this is a great time of year to be a movie geek. Not only are the theatres filled with all kinds of holiday blockbusters and Oscar bait, but those magical, wonderful trailers showing us the first glimpses of next summer's blockbusters start popping up.

The latest one is for Terminator: Salvation. Thanks to the time travel wackiness of the Terminator franchise, this serves as both a prequel and a sequel, as we finally get our first film about the Future War against the machines.





This is actually one where my interest is very, very slim. The Terminator franchise is one that can be put to rest in my books. The Terminator and Terminator 2: Judgment Day form a very nice 2-part story. While I found Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines to be fairly entertaining, it was wholly unnecessary. And I haven't even tuned in to the new TV show yet, The Sarah Connor Chronicles.

Anyway, it'll probably satisfy my thirst for giant robot mayhem until Transformers 2 comes out in July. We should be getting our first trailer for that in February.

For the vital stats: Christian Bale takes over as humanity's savior, John Connor. Bryce Dallas Howard is his wife and second-in-command Kate Connor. Anton Yelchin, soon to be seen as young Chekov in Star Trek, is the young Kyle Reese. Sam Worthington is Marcus Wright, a man with a shadowy past who just might be the newest Terminator to hunt down John Connor. Helena Bonham Carter is Serena, the lead villian. And Austrian bodybuilder/Arnold Schwarznegger lookalike Roland Kickinger takes over as the T-800.

The director is McG, who gave us the Charlie's Angels films.

May 2009.

Latest Targ's Up!

It's Sunday! New podcast day! This week's episode of U62: The Targ is....

Episode 2.13: Ramble Ramble, where I finally offer up my thoughts on the Star Trek trailer, discuss European condom sizes, and share my Christmas plans!

Go give it a listen!

And here I am on iTunes!

Quantum of Solace Review Up!

I saw it over a week ago, but I finally put up my review of the James Bond flick, Quantum of Solace!

Go read it!

Latest Targ's Up!

It's time for another fantabulous episode of U62: The Targ!

This week's podcast provides a very unique experience. When I did this one, I was suffering from the worst headache I'd had in ages. I had taken close to the allowable limit of Tylenol. And, I figured I still had to put on a show.

The end result? Episode 2.12: Work Through the Pain

Go give it a listen!

And subscribe in iTunes!

A Reason to Vote

So, today, the Conservative government unveiled a "fiscal update" to try to address concerns with the upcoming economic downturn.

What's getting a lot of press right now is that the Conservative propose to do away with one of the federal subsidies to political parties. I've blogged about this in the past...if a political party gets more than 2% of the popular vote, then they get $1.75 for each ballot cast for them.

Well, the Conservative want to scrap that. The Tories say that the political parties should set a good example, "pay their own bills" and that "the free ride for political parties" has to stop.

The opposition parties are pissed, of course. They're calling it an attack on democracy. They're accusing the Tories of trying to cripple the opposition parties financially. According to this article at the CBC, the subsidy accounts for 65% of the Green Party's revenues, 86% of the Bloc Quebcois', and 63% of the Liberals.

As we all know, the Tories boycott the Ottawa Press Corp, claiming that the Ottawa Press Corp has the Liberal bias. So, this evening, Finance Minister Jim Flaherty was doing the rounds via satallite on local news casts, selling this to Canadians.

I saw Flaherty getting interviewed by Daryl McIntyre on CTV Edmonton. The issue of the subsidy came up, and McIntyre asked, "But there are those who argue this subsidy combats voter apathy...that people will still get out and vote for their party, knowing that even if their candidate won't win, they'll still have done some good by giving some money to their party. Do you really want to get rid of this weapon in the war on voter apathy?"

Flaherty burst out laughing and said, "I've run in 6 elections, and I've never heard of anyone voting for that reason."

Well, Mr. Flahery, I know you probably don't read my blog, but this subsidy is the reason why I've voted in the past three elections. I don't agree with you and a lot of your party's policies, but I do know that this is Alberta, and no matter how many times I vote against you, you're going to get in.

The only reason I vote is to make sure that someone else gets another $1.75 to try to bring you down.

If you get rid of this subsidy, I'm going to start staying home on election days.

Star Trek Trailer: Special Edition

So, Paramount just release a new "special edition" of the Star Trek trailer. What did they add?

Leonard Nimoy as Spock!





As cool as this is, I just can't help but think that Paramount did this just to appease the fans. Trolling the Star Trek message boards, the trekkies who were screaming, "THIS IS A TRAVESTY TO ALL OF STAR TREK! GENE RODDENBERRY IS TURNING IN HIS GRAVE!" are now saying, "Leonard Nimoy brought a tear to my eye. I'm now cautiously optimistic."

Review: Futurama: Bender's Game

You know I don't consider straight-to-DVD movies worthy enough to be given full-blown movie reviews at my regular site, so they get stuck getting reviewed over here in the blog. I picked up my latest straight-to-DVD epic this weekend, so let's get reviewing!

Futurama: Bender's Game

Directed by Dwayne Carey-Hill

Starring the voices of Billy West, Katy Segal, John DiMaggio, Tress MacNeille, Maurice LaMarche, Phil LaMarr, Lauren Tom, David Herman, Kath Soucie and the man, the legend, Frank Welker.

Backstory: All right, the third of the four Futurama straight-to-DVD movies has been unleashed upon us! The first one was awesome, the second one was good but not great, what will number 3 hold?

Plot: It's life as normal for the Planet Express crew. The rising price of dark matter (the substance that fuels spaceships in the Futurama-verse) is getting ridiculously high. This leads Professor Farnsworth to reveal the truth: dark matter was once a useless, inert substance until his experiments turned it into fuel. The Professor still has a crystal that could convert dark matter back into a useless substance. The crew then goes on a perilous quest to Mom's dark matter mine to destroy the dark matter and thus ruin Mom's monopoly on starship fuel. Meanwhile, Bender starts playing Dungeons and Dragons with Cubert and his friends, and his imagination goes into overdrive, making Bender believe that he actually exists in a magical realm called Cornwood. These two plotlines collide when a massive surge of energy from the dark matter turns our universe into Cornwood. Now stuck in a magical realm, Farnsworth's crystal has become a magical artifact of "One Ring"-type power, and its up to the crew to quest through this land and destroy the crystal. Can they do it? In various other subplots, the Planet Express ship gets trashed in a demolition derby, Leela gets outfitted with a shock collar that zaps her whenever her thoughts turn to violence, and we learn the shocking truth about Mom's son Igner.

What I Liked: There's a stronger plot in this one...it doesn't feel as episodic as The Beast with a Billion Backs. And there's something truly magical about George Takei screaming, "You ruined the franchise, Bakula!"

What I Didn't Like: The whole "Futurama" resurrection novelty is starting to wear off, and it feels like the creators aren't trying anymore. Let's hope they put their best foot forward for the fourth and final straight-to-video film.

Final Assesment: A good, solid Futurama outing.

3 Nibs

DVD Bonus Material:

• Running commentary with the voice cast and crew
• Animatics
• Futurama Genetics Lab: Play "If They Mated" with the Futurama characters!
• Dungeons & Dragons & Futurama: Featurette about making the film
• How to Draw Futurama in 83 Simple Steps
• 3D Models with Animator's Commentary
• Deleted Scene
• Blooperama 2: See the voice cast blowing their lines in the recording booth!
• Bender's Anti-Piracy Warning
• Trailer for the fourth and final film, Into the Wild Green Yonder, due out in the spring.
  

Newest Targ's Up!

Sunday morning. The promise of a new day. The promise of a new week. The promise of pancakes for breakfast. The promise of...a new episode of U62: The Targ!

This week, it's Episode 2.11: One Sad Panda. This panda is sad because Pushing Daisies got the boot. But, there's good stuff, too! I debate whether I should apply to be an Olympic torchbearer, and the epic crossover I've been waiting for since I was 8 years old has finally come to pass: MASK and G.I. Joe!

Click here to listen to it!

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