Buttmonkeys

Figures, I always say that if there's a sort of supreme power that directs the events in our universe, it's Cosmic Irony.

So when I went to the movies tonight to see Die Hard 4.0, a movie I had said I wouldn't watch in the movies, and definitely not on opening day, what happens? There's a black out and the screening is canceled. Friggin' figures.

I'll try again tomorrow. Although tomorrow by all rights I should be at the Chris Cornell concert.

Yes, this is a whine post. First one ever in this blog, but I feel it's justified. And I don't care if you don't agree. :P

Temptation

Must...
not...
give...
in...
to...
it.

No, I'm neither debating selling my soul to the Devil nor buying an iPhone. Is there a difference anyway? :p

It's quite simpler, Live Free or Die Hard opens up today here in Athens, in some of my favorite summer theaters too. Things were simpler when everybody thought this movie would suck, I was supposed to see it on DVD or perhaps go to the movies with some friends to make fun of it.

At the moment, it was the most logical thing to do. A whole twelve years later after the last Die Hard movie (which kicked ass, haters be damned), a fucking PG-13 rating, over the top action, a John McClane and Macguy? "Ugh" was the the first word that came to mind, and I'm not referring to the obscure platform game from the early-mid 90's.

Live Free or Die Hard sounded like it was a day late and a dollar short. Or several of those, perhaps.

But then the buzz started building. Early word on the movie is very positive, some people are even saying it's better than parts two and three. Sacriledge? Who knows. But over at Rotten Tomatoes, it's currently standing at 76% fresh, a really damn good percentage for an action movie. Surely all these people must be on to something?

Yet here lies the rub: Is Live Free or Die Hard a good action movie? It sure sounds like it at this point. But is it a good Die Hard movie? I'm still not sure about that. The reason the originals were so damn good is because John McClane wasn't the usual Hollywood (super)hero. He had too many flaws, he got his ass kicked, even if he did get the job done at the end.

Just look at his condition by the end of each movie. He is bloodied and bruised, nothing like the poster-boy heroes from other movies, which seem like they could walk from a nuclear explosion without a scratch. Yet that's exactly what this bald rendition of McClane looks like in Live Die or Die Hard. Too much of a badass for his own good. And this is the reason why I'm still not sold on this film, despite the positive reviews and word of mouth.

I am sure now, however, that I won't avoid seeing it today, on its opening day. Le sigh. I'll probably update later with my impressions when I come back from the movies.

Sex, Droga, Dejan Bodiroga

No big news lately, as this heatwave that's scorching Greece right now has pretty much killed my will to do anything.

So here's a small tribute to one of my favorite basketball players of all time, who retired a couple of weeks ago, Dejan Bodiroga.

One of the greatest players to come from that region of Europe formerly known as Yugoslavia, Bodiroga was one of those players that could easily fill any position on court, from playmaker to making shots in the paint. He also had amazing "Basketball IQ" as they call it these days, being able to almost always make the correct judgement at any given circumstance, not to mention being an excellent clutch shooter. He definitely bailed my team Panathinaikos a lot of times when he was playing for us.

At 34, Bodiroga's retirement may have been a bit premature, but I guess it's better to retire while you're still at your prime rather than just playing for a few minutes every now and then and having your averages drop too much.

Here's a vid of highlights, not the best around, but I couldn't find any better ones at the moo.

Snacky's journal

One of the best things to come out of this whole World of Warcraft craze is all the machinima videos that have been created with the game's graphic engine.

I plan on making a full list of the best ones, as they are really brilliant, but I won't be doing that now since my PC is still acting up. In the meantime, here's a trailer for the third part of what is probably the funniest series of them all, Snacky's journal.

Fedoras and whips, oh my.

Shooting has begun on the new Indiana Jones movie during the past four days, after years of rumors and speculations. We will find out if it's worth the wait on May 22, 2008. Or you will, I will probably be in the army then *raises his fist in anger*.

It's hard not to be skeptical with all these recent relaunching of various movie franchises lately, most of which were mediocre at best (Rocky, TMNT etc.). And let us not forget about Die Hard PG-13, I mean uh, Die Hard 4.0 which hits theaters next week. I'm still debating whether I should see it in them movies or just boycott it. I mean, it's PG-13. Yippie Kie-Yay Mr. Falcon? *shudders*

So far, I wasn't too sure about the new Indy movie either. The entire franchise (including the Indiana Jones adventure games) is really special to me, so I want to love this movie. But... It's been almost 20 years since The Last Crusade, Sean Connery won't be in it, and isn't Harrison Ford at 64 a little too old for the role?

But today, I saw the following picture:



While looking at it, the Indiana Jones main theme starting playing in my mind.

It just feels right. That's not an old Harrison Ford, that's Indiana Jones. A bit older since we last saw him to be sure, but that's our Indy alright.

I don't know, it could be just nostalgia speaking here, but I am really looking forward to it now. I mean, it's Indiana Jones, how can you mess that up? Even with the rumored plot going on around (don't ask, it's for the best if you don't know), it will take a tremendous amount of effort to make this a bad movie.

I am pretty sure that it would have been better if this movie had come out a decade ago, but it still has the potential to be really flippin' good. Please don't mess this one up, Spielberg. Our childhood/early teen memories have been raped enough already.

A midsummer night

Tonight was the summer solstice, one of the two times of the year when the sun is at its greatest distance from the celestial equator, the longest day of the year. It's also called midsummer.

(I'm auditioning for the Captain Obvious '07 award, how am I doing?)

It's also one of my favorite nights of the year. Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream is one of my favorite plays. The loosely-related song by the Stranglers, Midnight's Summer Dream is also one of my favorite songs.

I have a strange fascination with all three, they have something eerie about them that I like oh so very much, even though I'm not sure why this is so.

I was planning on writing something deep and meaningful about the meaning of this night, but the immense heat, a damn headache, random PC crashes, and my own incompetence forbid me from doing so.

I guess this post is my very own Lost in La Mancha.

During the next three days I'll make some basketball-related posts I've wanted to make for a while now. I've found my love for that game again, after so many years, and football be damned.

Don't *ever*...

...Underestimate the heart of a champion.

(I don't take any particular pleasure in being so laconic, but my PC keeps crashing so I doubt I have time to post anything more. Gief my laptop back)

'Bout time.

'Nuff said.

Lord, why do you test us so?

I had heard that there was a Castlevania movie in the works. I had also heard that comic book writer Warren Ellis was behind the script, and I'm a huge fan of the franchise so I was trying to remain cautiously optimistic. And then I read this:

"Scripted by Paul W.S. Anderson ("Alien vs. Predator"), the drama begins as a Transylvanian knight leads his men into a gothic castle to seek refuge from the Turkish army. The knights soon discover the castle is controlled by the original vampire."

Why God, why?

More here, be prepared to weep. In great quantities.

Gentlemen, get your brooms

I wanted to post this since yesterday, but I couldn't log in for some reason.

At any rate, enjoy Brazil's "finest" at work. Shame he can't flop out of that one.



Hopefully the Spurs will end this parody on the next game.

Bars for Mars

Between Anneke van Giersbergen leaving The Gathering (am I ever glad I finally managed to see them live before this happened...) and Sean Connery announcing (hardly an official link, but it'll do) that he won't be in Indiana Jones 4, this day seemed to offer nothing but bad news.

Yet while casually killing time on the internets, I run into another campaign of loyal Veronica Mars fans trying to save their favorite show from cancellation. Being the cynical skeptic that I am, I usually treat this kind of campaigns with dry amusement, some people never realize when they've lost the battle. After all, when was the last time an online petition ever had actual results?

Yet these people are actually trying something a lot more creative, taking a leaf out of the campaign to save Jericho, which by the way was met with success. And if Jericho, in all honesty a mediocre show which I personally hated, can be saved, then Hellfire and Brimstone, why shouldn't this work for Veronica Mars?

The current plan calls for loyal viewers to send as many "Mars" chocolate bars to CW execs before June 15, when the final decision for the show's future is going to be taken. And for those that can't afford to send a Mars, you can even send a JPEG image.

The two main sites where you can find more info on this are BarsForMars.com and Save Veronica Mars, which also has a very comprehensive list of things one can do in order to help VM from getting cancelled for good.

I have to say, I also saw something in this campaign that managed to warm my jaded heart just a bit. Some people are offering Mars bars for $1.79 and with free shipping if you're intending to send such a bar to the CW execs. Definitely a very decent initiative.

Now I've said before (in too many posts) that I was actually content with the idea of Veronica Mars ending its run this year. It ended on a high note after hitting an all-time low in both ratings and quality during the mid-season (honestly, when the "Pizonika" incident occured I swear I could see someone jumping over a shark in the background, possibly Logan), with a wonderfully bittersweet ending that fit the series's themes perfectly. Also, I've always believed that it's better for things to just end than drag along, and this goes for VM as well. Three seasons are good enough.

However, the whole idea of Veronica in the FBI I had mentioned in an earlier post really grew on me in the meantime, and it's the one that we'll apparently get if the show does get picked up for another season. I could really see this working. Effectively, it would be a reboot, something they already tried to do with this season and the new college setting, but this one could actually work. No more teen relationship-drama, with V being all grown up and in the FBI now, gone would be most of the new and annoying supporting cast (fuck off, Piz), and so on and so forth.

If the last episode of season 3/the entire series, appropriately called "The Bitch is Back" showed us anything, it's the fact that the series is at its best when Veronica is a brooding, misanthropic outcast, indeed, when she is a bitch*. I could see that happening if she were to join the FBI, not many people would take a miniscule blond girl trying to be an FBI agent seriously, so she could very well be an outcast yet again.

And of course, the new setting would be ideal for the return of the Noir feel of season one. Darker, grittier storylines, moody atmosphere... if done well, it could be perfect. This would also be a great way to market the series to a new, more mature audience. My guess is that most people past their mid-twenties would much more easily take interest in a Noir-themed show based on an FBI agent rather than a high school/university student. Almost a win/win situation, if you ask me. We get the VM we fell in love with during the first season, and the studio gets a solid viewer base.

I am honestly contemplating writing a letter to the CW and joining in on this little campaign thing. It has to be a letter though and not a simple email, a letter is much more powerful, it would seem. I did it with the Sam and Max campaign back in '04, and that was a battle we won. I'm just worried that the letter won't make it on time, which kind of sucks. And I'm not going to send an actual Mars bar alongside it, of course. It will definitely go bad by the time it gets there, and that would not only be gross, but also rather counter-intuitive.

Lastly, I just have to post this image because I really love it. Amusingly enough, this was created two years ago, after season one had ended and people were demanding that UPN would continue the show for at least one more season. It's kind of funny to think how many near-cancellations this show has had. Let's see if it can survive this one as well.



*Interestingly enough, if VM were a male character the appropriate word to use in this context would be "badass". Food for thought, I believe.

Wait a sec

It's weird, I was certain I had made a post about the Stardust trailer that was released about two months ago, but it turns out I hadn't. Oh well, better late than never. Here's the trailer for those of you that haven't seen it:



(High-quality trailer here.)

I'm not really sure what to make of this trailer. Stardust is still my most anticipated movie at the moment, but this trailer is a bit... eh. Still, it's just a trailer, I have faith that it will be a good movie.

The original book is a quite simple, yet charming and enchanting, fairy tale. Hopefully the movie will have the same appeal. The visuals are there, and the cast seems solid too. Not too sure about Claire Daines, but hey, Sienna Miller's presence balances it all out.

The official site has also been updated with a lot of interesting content, and it's also really well designed. Worth a visit, I think.

Crazy in the coconut

I've wanted to post this video for a few days now, but I kept forgetting. Seems somehow oddly appropriate.

Scooter Libby also got 30 months. Probably too few, if you ask me. I'd give him more, for the nickname alone.

Anyway, here's the best music video in the history of music videos.

Ain't freedom of speech great?

I decided to pull my rant about Hugo Chavez as I found out I was missing some important information and came off harsher than I should. I'll reevaluate and repost it later. My point about the Art expo here in Athens, birthplace of "democracy" remains, however.

Last Saturday, policemen invaded the "Art Athina" expo and arrested its director, with the excuse that he allowed the showing of a short video that defiled the image of a national symbol, more specifically Greece's national anthem. The creator of the video was also supposed to be arrested, but luckily for her she was in Germany at the time.

If you're Greek you can read more here, and if you're not, I guess you'll just have to take my word for it.

Also, if you're interested in seeing the video in question, you can visit this website, and then click on the gray "art-athina international art fair" button, the first fourty seconds is what you want to see. There is no sound during that time presumably for fear of further lawsuits, but as the subtitles point out, the only thing that was heard was the Greek national anthem. This being the internets, you can probably find it in a matter of seconds if you want to.

At this point, I should confess that I am no fan of what kids these days call "modern art". In most cases I find it pretentious, pointless, and more often than not just plain tedious. This is how I felt about the last piece of art that was legally persecuted here three years ago, a painting of somebody's cock cumming on (or near) a Christian cross, and this is also how I feel about this video.

I'm sure their creators have some explanation on why their creations should be taken seriously, but as far as I'm concerned, I'm more likely to chuckle at them than consider them as a meaningful piece of art, that's just me.

But that is not the point. A mere forty seconds of video, no matter what the content, are not enough to destroy the national pride of anyone, despite what the prosecutors are arguing in this case. Hell, people weren't arrested when they were singing songs praising the military Junta that ruled (and screwed up) Greece from 1967 to 1974. Yet it seemed perfectly fine to make an exception for a video of a girl playing with herself.

If anything, removing the video from the expo would be bad enough, but suing and arresting people over it? That's way too fucking Orwellian for my taste.

Seriously. This is getting scary.

Waiting for Godot

No, not that Godot.

It has been confirmed (for a bit now actually) that Phoenix Wright 3, the final Ace Attorney game to feature Nick Wright will be released in the States and Europe in Fall of the current year. It's also supposedly the best game of the series so far.

As a huge fan of the series, I'm really looking forward to it. #4 scares me a bit, but I'm prepared to love #3, even though I've read some spoilers I really wish I hadn't. >.>

And of course, playable Mia! Who can say no to that?

Here's the official trailer: