The Dark Knight Review - Here Be Spoilers

You have been warned.

The Dark Knight starts off with a Bank Robbery with clown-mask wearing robbers. Some guy called the Joker is calling the shots. It also seems that whenever someone accomplishes their task they are killed by the robber behind him, until only one remains. That one removes his clown mask to reveal a make-upped and scarred face. He is The Joker. I found it interesting that the Joker in this telling in fact wore make up to give him that pasty complexion. In Chris Nolan’s Batman, everything has to have a real feel element, and so if someone were to fall into a vat of toxins, they would die, rather than come out with white skin and green hair. This works for me. The next time the Joker appears, he is confronting a group of mob bosses, and starts to explain his plan. The mob bosses are mad at him, because it was their money he was stealing from the bank. The Joker then proceeds to do a magic trick, in which he makes a pencil disappear. This was probably the most shocking moment of the movie for me, because at this point we didn’t know what type of villain he would be, and bam… the pencil disappeared… eraser end first mind you. Yes, this was going to be a very intense movie. They weren’t pulling any punches with the Joker. He will go down as one of the best movie villains in the history of cinema. He was cruel, calculating, and quite frightening. He was also quite insane. I think my favorite Joker moment was when he was walking away from the hospital as it exploded. This felt right out of a comic book to me, which is why I enjoyed it so much. He started off the series of detonations *before* he was even out of the hospital. And then when the final kaboom didn’t happen… that was just classic. And to top it off his outfit made it all the more ludicrous. I can picture the scene in comic book format, and it is perfect. Yes, the Joker stole the show, but I don’t think he would have done without the characters he stole it from.

Don’t forget… there are spoilers present…

Batman… I absolutely love this Batman. He *is* the Batman from the comics. He is the bone breaking, shuriken throwing (albeit Batshaped shuriken), gadget toting, non-lethal Batman. I was 15 when Tim Burton’s Batman came out, and hadn’t read the comics. It didn’t bug me that Batman killed bad guys in Batman and Batman Returns. Then I found out that Batman doesn’t kill people in the comics, and those movies lost a little something. And then in Batman Forever, the Batman I knew would have saved Two-face. He was able to save Robin from the same death… heck, it would have been even better had Robin saved Two-face. Anyway, I digress. So when Batman chucked Joker off the building, in a split second I thought “Good… wait, no… Batman will have killed him if he hits the ground.” Then I think I sighed and rolled my eyes. Then the totally unexpected happened. Batman shot out his grapple thing, and saved the Joker’s life! I cheered! I was so happy! Chris Nolan understands Batman, and that is pleasing.

What? The spoilers don’t end there? Nope… in fact there’s some bad ones ahead…

Harvey Dent. He’s what the movie was all about. It truly was a Harvey Dent / Two-face movie, and Joker was the vehicle in which Harvey travels. Yes, Two-face had a different origin story in the comics, but this worked just as well. Actually it may have worked better. What better way for a man to snap then to have your girlfriend say she’ll marry you, and then hear her die. After the explosion, we finally get to see Two-face, and this was one of the few times Chris Nolan left his “grounded in reality” world of Batman. His scarred side was very shocking, and looked very similar to some of the comics, and the Batman Animated series, but honestly I was expecting something less… less being more in these movies. I figured his face would be that of a burn victim, which would have been shocking enough, but no… this time they went over the top, and I was a little disappointed by it. Character wise, Two-face was written very well indeed. And his final moments with the Gordon family and Batman were excellent. Including himself with the coin toss rotation, and the internal struggle as Jim plead with him, and then relying on the coin toss to make his decision. I was disappointed that Harvey died mainly because I was expecting him to be the villain in the next movie, but also pleased that Batman didn’t kill him. Batman saved the child and himself, and if he could have, he would have saved Harvey… I know he would have. That’s what Batman does.

Ahh… no more spoilers.

Soo… yes it did have a flaw here or there in my opinion, but they are very excusable. There was no sex / nudity, which in my books is a plus. There was no swearing that I recall, which in my books is a plus as well. And there was no over the top, graphic, blood splattering violence… that was shown. It was rated PG-13, and I wouldn’t recommend anyone under 14 seeing it, as it was quite disturbing and somewhat frightening. Having said that… this was almost a perfect movie from my point of view. I really hope that this group makes a 3rd movie, but only if they can make it as good as Batman Begins, because there is no way to top this one.

I give it 9.7 out of 10… it’s an arbitrary number and doesn’t really mean anything, but I think Two-face’s face not being grounded in reality lost a few points.

Oh yes, and if you have the means, see it in the IMAX… I totally recommend that.

The Big Picture

The Boston Globe has a blog called the big picture and today's was about the Chinese Military practicing anti-terrorist drills. I'm really not sure what to make of this shot...If you have a reader of some sort, like Google Reader, then I highly suggest adding The Big Picture to your list of feeds.

Must breathe... Hooooo heeeee hooooo heeeee

This is why I want a Wii... this has always *been* the reason for wanting a Wii. Especially after reading that The Force Unleashed Lightsaber isn't 100% reactive to your own movements.

Stolen from theforce.net (which stole from Lucasarts.com)

STAR WARS THE CLONE WARS: LIGHTSABER DUELS™ (Wii)Now everyone can experience the fun and excitement of a Lightsaber fight. Star Wars The Clone Wars: Lightsaber Duels immerses you in the characters, locations, and epic duels from the all-new Star Wars animated feature film and TV series. Built from the ground-up for Wii™, Lightsaber Duels features an intuitive motion-controlled combat system that puts the Lightsaber™ weapon in your hand. Mastering the Jedi's distinctive weapon is now within any player's grasp.

-Fight the most memorable duels from The Clone Wars feature film and TV series.
-Wield your Wii Remote like a Lightsaber and experience first-hand the unique weapon of the Jedi knights with intuitive controls, so no matter what your gaming experience you can become a Lightsaber master.
-Play with your friends as your favorite Clone Wars hero or villain - from familiar characters like Anakin Skywalker and General Grievous to new faces like Ahsoka Tano and Asajj Ventress - each with a unique fighting style and set of skills.
-Exploit your interactive surroundings to defeat your opponent: slice down pillars and Force throw them against your foe.
-Duel your way through significant Clone Wars locations, such as Tatooine and Teth.

That's a Space Station!

So yup… she’s official. The Lego Death Star Playset. Holy SMOKES. I would love to have a set like this, because it just looks like so much fun to actually play with. It has 3800 pieces, and so at $500 CAD, the price has dropped to 13 cents per piece (usually 14 cents). On the other hand, the price in the states has risen to 10.5 cents (usually 9.5 cents). Good for us… bad for them. But here’s the kicker. When I mentioned earlier that it had 24 minifigs, I failed to notice one. The Dianoga! How sweet is that? (That’s the trash compactor monster for the uninformed out there.) So here’s a list of all the people you get.

Luke Skywalker™ (Stormtrooper™ outfit), Han Solo™ (Stormtrooper outfit), Assassin Droid™, Interrogation Droid, Death Star Droid, 2 Death Star Troopers™, Luke Skywalker, Han Solo, Obi-Wan Kenobi™, C-3PO™, R2-D2™, Princess Leia™, Chewbacca™, Luke Skywalker (Jedi Knight), Darth Vader™, Grand Moff Tarkin™, Emperor Palpatine™, 2 Stormtroopers, 2 Emperor's Royal Guards™, R2-Q5™, a mouse droid and the all-new Dianoga™ trash compactor monster!

Ayup… that’s a good amount. Anyway, I am pleased with this set, though at $400 US, I don’t think I have the means to buy it at this time… even for Alex. Perhaps in 3 or 4 years if it’s still available. Hey… my Star Destroyer is, and it came out about 6 years ago.

Review: Kingdom of the Crystal Skull

On my way to the theater I found myself thinking “Do I really want to go see this movie? So many people have told me that it sucks, and that it diminished the other movies. That the CGI spoiled the movie and there was no urgency, no fear for the characters. Maybe I’d rather go see The Incredible Hulk.” Then I mentally slapped myself and said “What are you talking about… it’s Indiana Jones, and you must see it on the big screen no matter what anyone says.” So I did.

The movie starts out with the new Lucasfilm logo… well, not really new anymore, but new since 1997, but then the Paramount logo from 1982 appears and then it fades and turns into a mound of dirt in the exact same shape, just as it did in Raiders and Crusade (though those were a mountain and a rock formation, respectively). Anyway, when I saw that I knew that they were going to try very hard to be true to the characters and movies of the 80’s.

We get taken through the storage warehouse from the end of Raider’s of the Lost Ark, which we found out is at the Air Force Base, Area 51. Indy gets into a scrap with the Ruskies, and bullets start flying. Indy of course is not hit by any of them, because he’s Indy! I remember seeing this other movie, where the hero was being chased by a bunch of Natives and even though they are probably very efficient with their spears and blow guns when hunting game and warring against other tribes, they can’t seem to even knick the hero… what was that movie called? What? Oh yeah! Raiders of the Lost Ark!

Then it gets a little silly… ok… it gets a lot silly. He goes and gets himself blown up by a Nuclear bomb. But no, he saves himself in a fridge. Don’t worry… the fridge is lead lined, and apparently also has Inertial Dampers and is a Super Fridge that can keep things cool even though outside is 2000 degrees C. They had much cooler stuff in the 50’s because they *had* to be prepared for just such an emergency, and didn’t have to worry about the EPA saying that it’s bad for the environment. Indy just needs to be scrubbed down afterwards… no big deal. I’m going to put it out there that he also keeps a vial of water from the Holy Grail on hand at all times for just such an emergency. Yes, yes, the grail’s power loses effect beyond the great seal, but work with me here people.

So we go on. Indy is accused of being a commie and is fired. He makes mention of the death of Marcus Brodie and Henry Jones Sr. Funny that he said first Dad, then Marcus, because Denholm Elliot is actually dead, but Sean Connery isn’t. It should have been the other way around.

He meets up with a knife juggling greaser, there is a chase, and we get to hear the Wilhelm and they go to South America. There they find a crystal skull, and the Ruskies find them. They threw in the old Serial gag of “Native-about-to-kill-sidekick-with-blow-dart but hero-jumps-up-and-blows-dart-backwards” which never made sense to me because how would the poison tip stick in the guy’s mouth, but it was from the serials, so it must be included.

Oh yes… the crystal skull? Alien. Nuff said.

Anyway, was it a perfect movie? No. Did the CGI diminish it? Somewhat. Was there a feeling of urgency, and did you fear for the hero’s life? Not at all. Was it entertaining? In my opinion, very much so, although it was entertaining in the same why that Wile E. Coyote entertains me. Absolute absurdity. Do I think that George, Steven, Harrison, and David Koepp believe that someone could survive a Nuclear blast in a fridge? Do you? Did you say to yourself “That’s not realistic” or did you laugh and enjoy the humor of it. I laughed when I noticed the fridge flying over the car… I still feared for Indy’s life a little with the Ant scene, because there wasn’t an ant proof fridge to be seen. Actually I feared more for Indy’s hat then I did for Indy.

I’m not afraid to say it… I’ll shout it from the roof tops. I LIKED THE PREQUELS A LOT! I DIDN’T FIND JAR-JAR ANNOYING! AND I THOROUGHLY ENJOYED KINGDOM OF THE CRYSTAL SKULL!!! There… I’ve said it. It was a fun movie that didn’t take itself seriously, and I will watch it again, and add it to my movie collection. This one ranks number 3 for me in the series. In this order: Raiders, Last Crusade, Crystal Skull, and a very distant 4th (5th or 6th if you include any of the video games) Temple of Doom (which I just really have a hard time watching… doesn’t entertain me at all).

I give Crystal Skull 3.5 Wah-PAA’s out of 5… it’s just an arbitrary number… it means nothing.

AFI 10 Top 10: A Rant.

So the American Film Institute (AFI) are a bunch of idiots. I thought the Academy Awards was political, but the AFI’s latest List is down right retarded. They did 10 categories and showed the top 10 movies in each category, that they felt were the 10 best for that category. Sports movies made sense; Gangster movies made sense; Sci-Fi movies mostly made sense… except for A Clockwork Orange. That movie was never on my books as Sci-Fi. And Westerns even made sense. Anyway… Fantasy made no sense at all. There was only one movie in the list that if you looked in the Fantasy section of a bookstore, would you find the novel of. That being Fellowship of the Ring. Umm… the only Fantasy movie to win a Best Picture Oscar was Return of the King… would *that* not qualify? Other “fantasy” movies in the list were Big, Groundhog Day, Field of Dreams, and Harvey. Those aren’t Fantasy… not really. I mean, yeah, they can’t happen in real life, but if that’s the only factor, where was Raiders of the Lost Ark? Actually I guess Harvey *can* happen in real life… it’s just a guy with an imaginary friend. I think I saw that in “A Beautiful Mind”. Fantasy should be about dragons or skeletons or magic. Where was the 7th Voyage of Sinbad? Where was Legend? Anyone ever hear of a movie called “The Dark Crystal”? The “#1” movie was The Wizard of Oz, which I would call fantasy, but was it better than Lord of the Rings? No… don’t be silly. 2001 A Space Odyssey was the number 1 Sci-Fi, with Star Wars (A New Hope) being #2. I guess you could say that 2001 was pure Sci-Fi, in that it is somewhat realistic and could even be achievable. It was an excellent book, but was it a good movie? I haven’t seen it, but others have called it boring, confusing, and artsie-fartsie. Now compare that to A New Hope. This movie changed the way Sci-Fi movies were made. It is a story of good vs. evil with good triumphing at the end. It’s a great movie that stands the test of time… at least it did until George went and made Han shoot second. 2001 obviously did not, because it’s 2008 and there’s still no moon base, space station with artificial gravity, or manned interplanetary space travel. It was rather funny that all but one of the Animated top ten were Disney or Disney-Pixar cartoons. The non-Disney cartoon was Shrek and it was number 8. Perhaps they don’t feel that Anime counts, because Akira was a dang fine movie. I hear that Princess Mononoke was also really good. What about Chicken Run or Curse of the Ware-rabbit? Both were really excellent animated movies. Oh yes… the #1 Romantic Comedy was a Charlie Chaplin silent picture called “City Lights”. Why? Quoting the AFI president: “When 'City Lights' is honored as the number 1 romantic comedy, millions of people will go back and watch it again." So basically they aren’t honoring any films, they are just using it as a 3 hour TV commercial for a bunch of movies that people don’t care about any more, and they throw some in that people do care about to keep them interested. Annie Freaking Hall. Anyway… I had to rant about that.

That's no moon!

Holy smokes! A Death Star playset is coming, and it looks like it will be very playable with. I just might have to buy this one, and put it away for Alex for when he's a touch older...

You can go here to see more pics. There are 24 minifigs that come with this set! TWENTY FOUR!!! 3 different Lukes! That's crazy! It also comes with a not quite mini TIE-Advanced X1 which also floats my boat.

Kudos to the Lego group for this one.

Mini Plane

Now, more than ever, do I want my pilot's license. And $140,000 just lying around wanting to be spent.

How fun it would be to fly this little plane down to Calgary for the weekend. And at a top speed of 222 km/h, you could get there in just over an hour, and wouldn't have to be strip searched at the airport.

Cubes

This is pretty neat. You can make an army of paper stormtroopers. I'm pleased to see a cubic Usagi Yojimbo as well. I loved that comic when I was... um... well... I still love that comic.

The Dark Knight

Batman Batman Bat Man, Batman Batman Batman... Batman?

The Dark Knight

Darth Curt's going to the Moon!

Well... his name is at least.

When is a Garfield comic funny?

The answer? When Garfield has been removed entirely and Jon is left to his own crazy hallucinations...

Some wonderful person has devoted a web-page to do just this... The comic becomes so absolutely absurd that I can't help but to laugh! Garfield Minus Garfield... go there now.

A Future Star Wars Convention Venue?

There are plans to build a new hotel on the Caspian Sea, which from one angle appears to be a very similar to a certain moon-sized space station. Of course, we can only hope that rebel spies don’t get their grubby hands on these and blow it to pieces just after completion.

Actually, though it looks like a globe, it really isn't... click the link above to see views from other angles.

The Clone Wars

Something came over the internet tubes yesterday that put a smile on my face. Star Wars: The Clone Wars, which is a half hour cartoon will be starting its series run in movie theaters as a 100 minute long episode. August 15th... I'll be there.

Speaking of that. While Samuel L. Jackson was being interviewed about the movie "Jumper" which he is staring with Haydon Christenson, he stated that he would love to lend his voice to Mace Windu's character. That would be excellent.

Haydon was asked the same question about voicing Anakin, and he said he'd jump at the opportunity. I can't say I'm suprised at that one... not that I don't think he's a good actor, I just don't see his schedule being as busy as Sam Jackson's.

Anyway... August 15. WOOT!

And Then They Pull the Rug Out from Under Us

So maybe The Hobbit won’t be made at all now. Apparently New Line Cinema, who had issues with paying Peter Jackson’s production company last year, but has since settle, also didn’t pay the Tolkien Estate a penny of the $6 Billion made from the theatrical release as well as the DVD’s. What is up with New Line… I guess someone never learned to share. Here’s a quote from the news release: New Line was required to pay 7.5 percent of gross receipts to Tolkien's estate and other plaintiffs. Let’s see… 7.5 percent of 6 Billion dollars is 450 Million dollars. You could see why the Tolkien Estate wants the money, and it is rightfully theirs based on the agreement signed before the movie rights were released.

Now here’s something interesting, also from the same article: The plaintiffs seek more than $150 million in compensatory damages, unspecified punitive damages and a court order giving the Tolkien estate the right to terminate any rights New Line may have to make films based on other works by the author, including "The Hobbit."

So fine… you want your money, and I can totally understand that. But if you win you not only take the money, you also stop The Hobbit from being made? That’s punishing the fans just as much as it is New Line… and it’s also punishing yourself. That part makes no sense to me. Yes, they are made at New Line, as was Peter Jackson a year ago, but they made up after everything settle.

Can’t we all just get along, and make some decent movies that are actually worth seeing? I feel the same as these Hobbits pictured below… sad that more movies about their race probably won’t be made, because of money grubbing scum.

Sucked In!

WOW! Yes… that’s right… Wow. Or more accurately: WoW. As in: World of Warcraft. After many, many years of purposely not playing World of Warcraft, I feel like I’ve finally got sucked in. My so called friends decided that I need to play, and so like the dealers of internet smack that they are, sent me a “free” trial. Yeah… there’s nothing free about this 10 day trial, I’m afraid. I’m going to play it, I’ll get hooked, because my awesome Dwarf Hunter will be 2 levels away from being able to get a pet (I’m hoping for a T-Rex, though I’ve been told that I can only get a Raptor) and the system will cut me off. “Sorry, that’s all you get. You’re done…. Unless you PAY for it.” This, of course, is followed by a wicked maniacal laugh. I will have no choice in the matter any more, for like the metaphorical drug that it is, I will have lost the will to not play any more, and I will spend 15 US dollars a month just to get to Level 60… because that’s what the game is all about. Then I will say “Level 60 isn’t high enough… I NEED to get to level 70!” And so I will go out and buy the expansion pack… I’m already crying myself to sleep in the fetal position, wishing that I could purge my system of WoW. Andrew and Mike: You are both pure evil.

Right now I’m just grateful that $15 US is pretty much $15 CAD. I guess it was only a matter of time. Once the Star Wars MMORPG based around 4000 BBY* which is being designed by BioWare comes out, then I will have no choice to play that either. Wookiee Scout, here I come!

*BBY: Before Battle of Yavin, or Before “A New Hope” which is what people who don’t know what Yavin is, or A New Hope is just refer to simply as Star Wars. As in the first one… but not Episode 1.

Movie Review: Dragonlance: Dragons of Autumn Twilight

Well… to start off, Dragonlance: Dragons of Autumn Twilight was fairly accurate to the novel. I haven’t read the novel for a good 10 years or so, so I’m a bit fuzzy, but it brought things back to my remembrance, and nothing seemed too out of place.
It’s a pretty typical Dungeons and Dragons style story with a whole gambit of characters: Half-elf, Barbarian, Cleric, Dwarf, Halfling (or Kender in this case), Mage, Knight, and a Fighter. They get into trouble, a quest is given to them by a unicorn and then by the king of the elves, the leader doesn’t want to be the leader, they win the battle, but the war continues on. Yup… that sounds just like the D&D campaign I was playing 10 years ago, except we had a monk that could punch a guy’s spine out with his bare hands. (Though he missed the spine by a few inches, and punched through the guy’s heart instead… same outcome.)

The animation was… how should I put this? Crap. It really was. Strawberry Shortcake cartoons have better animation than this. It was very similar to the animation in the D&D cartoon from the 80’s, but I think even that was better. What was very odd though was that all the dragons and draconians (which are different than goblins) were CG 3D animation, which looked really clean and cool… but made the cell animation look that much worse. When I first heard that they were making this movie, and it was to be animated, I pictured TMNT and thought, yes… this is going to be really good animation. Alas… I was disappointed. There were also a lot of gratuitous cleavage and butt shots, which just seemed silly and very out of place.

The voice acting was really well done however, and I thought Kiefer Sutherland as the mage Raistlin was an excellent choice. His voice was kind of how I imagined it would be: a little rough and gravelly. Xena… I mean Lucy Lawless was the Plainswoman Cleric, and Michael “Lex Luther” Rosenbaum was the reluctant leader Tanis Half-elven. They did some good voice acting, and it was hard to tell it was them. All the other voices seemed to be well cast too.

All in all, I give this movie 3.5 outta 5, because as for story and acting, it was really good. The animation was really lacking though, which is really unfortunate in this day of superb and cheap animation.

As an aside, I am reading Dragons of Dwarven Depths, which is a new book that takes place between Dragons of Autumn Twilight and Dragons of Winter Night. The movie summed up Autumn Twilight excellently, and so I am not lost while reading this new book. (Though I don’t think any editors read this book, and if an editor DID read it, he/she needs to be fired. More typos then I’ve ever seen in a book, and they even forgot that the Kender had given his knife to the Fighter’s girlfriend before she left on a solo adventure… I’m really disappointed on the editing front.)

So today, the temperature dropped down to -34 Celsius. For any yanks reading this blog, that would be -29 Fahrenheit. With the wind chill it felt like -41 Celsius (which is pretty much -41 Fahrenheit). I guess I should feel lucky, because yesterday it was only -29, but felt like -46 with the wind. And yes, because we are crazy Canucks that live in Edmonton, we still made it to work. My daughter didn’t get to kindergarten yesterday because there were 3-foot high drifts blocking the exits out of our parking lot. Anyway, here’s something odd that came up on the government of Canada’s Weather page…


Notice that the “forecasted” low for today is -28 and the forecasted high is -28? Yet, it’s -34? Notice that none of the other lows drop below -28? Is that coincidence or is their program broken and won’t recognize anything below -28. Anyway, I thought that was weird.

Happy Birthday Lego! Part 2

This is a fun time line of Lego's life, stolen from gizmodo.com.

If you look at the guy on the box in the 50th Anniversary set... he's the kid that appeared on the first set Lego made 50 years ago. And it was the same set! Neat, huh.

Happy Birthday Lego!

Yay!!! I guess. Today marks the 50th Anniversary of the World’s Favorite Building Material. No… not concrete. LEGO! This continues to be my favorite toy, despite the fact that they still have yet to match the Canadian Dollar with the US Dollar. Anyway… as Google reminded me today…
…Happy Birthday you crazy interlocking brick that never gets boring.

New Star Wars Lego Sets for 2008

So Lego has released its list of what Star Wars sets are coming out for 2008, and I must say I’m a little excited. I’m also a little bit nervous.

First off, they have already released a picture of the rerelease of the AT-TE, which for the uninitiated is the 6 legged walker in Attack of the Clones, The Clone Wars, and Revenge of the Sith. I already own this set, so I won’t be getting this new one. Actually it looks to be pretty much the same, except that this one comes with a STAP, where as the one I got 5 years ago (HOLY SMOKES!!! Has it really been that long???) came with a burgundy Speeder Bike, which shows up in Battle Front, and the Novelization. Anyway, I’m happy with the set I have.

What gets me excited (and nervous) is this. The list included a TIE Defender, which is pictured here. The TIE Defender is from the old MS-DOS video game TIE Fighter, and it was the ultimate TIE ship. It had a hyper-drive and shields, and if I remember correctly was more maneuverable then the TIE Interceptor. This ship just looks mean as well, and if it does come out this summer, I will be picking it up as soon as I see it in stores. The thing that has me nervous is that on one list someone has that set (7678) listed as a Droid Gunship, which the TIE Defender isn’t. I just hope that they made a mistake, and it truly is the TIE D, because… well… Boromir says it best...

Does Jack Ryan really need Tom Clancy?

This was just quoted this weekend on Dark Horizons.

In late 2006 came word that Paramount Pictures was planning to continue its successful Jack Ryan action franchise with a fifth film that would NOT be based on one of Tom Clancy's books.

Well, why not? I mean, Sum of All Fears wasn’t based on a Tom Clancy novel either (even though it shared the title). At the beginning of the commentary on the DVD, Tom Clancy says “Hi, I’m Tom Clancy, the author of the book they didn’t read.” How much more evidence do you need? They changed the villains, the location, the age and marital status of Jack, his position in CIA… at least they set off a Nuke at a football game, but they even screwed that up. Just sad…

“Clear and Present Danger” was just barely based on the book. Why did they make the Captain of the Coast Guard ship a woman? In the book it was a grizzled old sailor who had internal dialog about how there’s a new girl recruit on his ship now, and they have to have a female head (toilet), and times they are a changin’. I guess that just wasn’t PC enough for Hollywood… anyway.

Was Sum a good movie? Sure. Was it a Tom Clancy / Jack Ryan movie? No… not really. So why not make more movies with the Jack Ryan name? Because the Tom Clancy books were good… up until the Bear and the Dragon (that one was just lame). The couple of books that turned up afterwards were alright in my opinion… but I digress. The movies that come out with Jack Ryan in them have just gotten worse and worse. Red October was great, Patriot Games was really quite good, though in the novel he doesn't kill Sean Miller, and I've already discussed the other two. IF they make another, it's going to be so awful... well... it really can't be worse than Sum of All Fears, and I guess they wouldn't be pretending to be basing it on a novel....

If a new Jack Ryan movie comes out, and it doesn’t even have the title of a Tom Clancy novel attached to it, don’t go see it. If it DOES have the title of a Tom Clancy novel, you probably shouldn’t see it either, because it won’t be based on any novel that he wrote. They will just pretend it is. Send stupid Hollywood a message, stating that we won’t put up with garbage just because you pretend it comes from a good source.

What I'd really like to see is someone brave enough to make “Debt of Honor” and be faithful to the story and fly that 747 into the Capital Building… it’s not like it’s going to give the terrorists any ideas, and I think it would put a very real context into the movie, like yeah… this really could happen again, and what are we doing to make sure it doesn’t. Anyway… that being said, I really hope they don’t make any more Jack Ryan movies, because they are so changed and watered down, they are truly pathetic. This goes for John Clark as well, in my opinion.

The Terminator Timeline has Been Terminated

Ok, so “Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles” just came out yesterday on TV, and I gotta say that I was very impressed. It had some really good action scenes, and some excellent effects… well, make-up at least. And it even tried to add some realism to the action (Read: Kevlar put in the back of the Lazy-boy). However, what it did not try to do was figure out the timeline.

As it stands right now:The Terminator took place in 1984. Fine, no problemo.
Terminator 2: Judgment Day took place in 1994. Fine, no probl… wait a second. You expect me to believe that John Connor is 9 (he would have been born in 1985) in T2? Eddie Furlong was 13 when he acted in that movie, so everyone figured that John Connor was approximately the same age.
Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines took place in 2004. Ok, John could be 20 or 23 or whatever in that movie… it works out.
Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles starts in 1999. Fine, no probl…. Wait a second. In T3, Sarah was said to have died of Leukemia shortly after Judgment Day was supposed to have happened. Hmmmm. Well, let’s just pretend that John was lying, and that Sarah was in hiding, or off the grid (because her coffin did not contain her body). But then they jump to 2007 and… wait… doesn’t the war start in 2004 as per T3? Did they just decide to ignore T3 and start the franchise over at 1999? I’d be ok with that, however, here’s something that they can do to make EVERYTHING work out.

Instead of hard-coding the year in the movies and TV shows, they can just asterisk them, and I use the following as an example.

Terminator 2: Judgment Day takes place in 1994. Because it was the best movie, that will stay firmly in place. John is 13. Thus, The Terminator can take place in 1***. Any year you want… 1874? Sure, but that makes no sense, so for now we’ll make the variables 980 so it takes place in 1980. Remember that she was pregnant, and probably wouldn’t have had John until 1981.

After T2, we now have Sarah Connor Chronicles, and it starts in 1***. Now, in T3, she was said to have died shortly after Aug 29, 1997 (Judgment Day). If instead of dying, she just dropped off the grid for 2 years, then low and behold, we can make those variables 999, and it works! Hey! Look at that! So in 1994, John was 13, and 5 years later, he’s 18. And can still be in High School! Grade 12!

Then they jump ahead to 2***. To make things easier, we can call it present day, so they don’t really have to invent or down grade technologies, so the variables can be 007. 2007!

Now that we have variables, T3 takes place in 2***. Right now, let’s say that John was 23 in T3, which is 5 years from the Pilot of Sarah Connor Chronicles, so the variables are 012. T3 now takes place in 2012. But these dates are not hard and fast. They remain variables, so any changes that come up (in either upcoming episodes of Sarah Connor Chronicles, or the upcoming trilogy staring Christian Bale as John Connor) can be easily dealt with, because any dates that show up should be 2*** from now on. Just put in the date that makes sense for the timeline.

There I just fixed it. The Studios can send me money.

Lego Pricing Rant

Some things, I just don’t understand. The new Star Wars and Indiana Jones Lego sets were released yesterday, and guess what! They are on average 1.4 times the price as those sold in the States. Why is this? We are at par with the US dollar, should we not have the same buying power as they do? I can understand the older sets staying at the same price, but why aren’t the new sets priced to match. This bugs me. Lego does have a few sets that are “on sale” that match the US price, but only a few, and not the one that I really want for my collection, which frustrates me even more.

I went into Toys R Us last night, and found 2 sets that I wanted. The prices were not listed on the shelves, so based on the piece count, I guessed that they would be $40 and $55 respectively. I went to a price checker, and they were $55 and $70 respectively. When I checked out the price on the US Lego page, I found that the first was actually $40 US and the second was $50 ($5 less than I thought it should be). Why this discrepancy? Why won’t the distributors match the prices? I would have bought both sets for $90, but I put both of them back because $55 is too much for a set that only has 390 some pieces. 10 cents a piece is perfect, though Canadian distributors feel the need to charge 14 cents. Grrrr. It makes me mad.

Oh, and they only had 1 Indiana Jones set, and of course, not the one I was going to buy! We Canadians always get the shaft in the toy department, it seems.

Note the difference in price!