(Last thing under a WIDW tag was a Doctor Who one that I never officially counted even if it sort of applies, so I'll call this #16)

Time for another edition of What I'd Do With... Yes, it's been quite a while since I've done one of these, mostly because I've been doing much more actual writing in the last year or so. But I still get WIDW type urges, and this time I thought I'd try something different, and to make up for the long absence, something a little more intensive than I usually do.

WIDW a movie about Marvel Comics Thor (actually, sort of WIDW a movie and its sequel)...
The why: ( Read more... )

The what: An actual script for my proposed Thor movie (albeit still in something of a rough form, I got to a point where I just wanted to get it done and didn't throw in my best work).

If that's too long for you, here's the summary-in-words:
( Read more... )

Rough thoughts about a sequel, in which I decided to include a character normally known to be in the X-Universe, and a classic Thor moment, and even a tiny bit of thoughts on the third movie: ( Read more... )

So, that's it. Comments welcome.

You can get to all my WIDWs here.

So, I had a Stargate-heavy dream last night. Atlantis, too, which is odd (although some of SG1 made an appearance)
( Read more... )

So, naturally, once I woke up (both while trying to fall asleep again and after I was on my way to work) my mind tried to refine the idea into something that might actually work in the show. Here's what I came up with (which doesn't match the dream very much except in one of the basic ideas).
( Read more... )
In conclusion, I should totally write for Stargate!

In other news, they're producing a movie of the first two Hyperion Books. On the one hand, this is kind of cool, as they're great books and I'd love to see how they translate to the screen. On the other hand, I think there's way too much in the books to fit in a movie. I always thought it would make an awesome miniseries (with the first book being told in one hour installments, one for each 'story' and the connective tissue around them, and then another couple of hour installments for the second book). Is there anything so worrying as a half-fulfilled wish? Ah well, we'll see how it goes.

I claimed the whole weekend in the name of me, because I got ripped off this year due to Easter. Still, it was a rather lame weekend, even ignoring the general depression of the day itself.

Saturday did the family thing, though not for me, it was for Easter. And, well, the food wasn't bad, but it was still several hours sitting around mostly with people I don't know very well if at all, along with a few very noisy kids running around all the time.

Otherwise, it was like pretty much any other weekend, except with the added inconvenience of the stores being closed two days. (Though it did have one pleasant side-effect.. had to run to the gas station to get something since the grocery stores weren't open, and I noticed they have flavours of Mr. Noodles they don't have in any of the grocery stores near me... Pork, and Creamy Chicken. Tried Creamy Chicken, it was okay but I still prefer Curry Chicken, but still, cool for finding a new flavour.)

It occurs to me, that since virtually everything you can't classify supposedly tastes like "chicken", then "artificial chicken flavour" in a list of ingredients is spectacularly unhelpful and unspecific. Crocodile meat supposedly tastes like chicken, so theoretically artificial chicken flavour could be from crocodile meat. THINK ABOUT IT. Or not.

Let's see, what else is new?

I've decided that I'm going to boycott the 2008 Olympics. Not because of what's happening in Tibet, I just think the Olympics are really lame.

Finally got around to making this icon. Not quite as good as the other one since I had to pull from various sources, but still relatively pleased with it.

Oh, and I finally got around to watching The Mist, the adaptation of one of my favorite Stephen King short stories (well, novellas). So how was it? Generally, it was an excellent adaptation of the novella, faithful in almost everything but the ending. So we'll talk about the ending. (Major spoilers, of course, for both the book and movie).
( Read more... )
In general the effects were good but some of the monsters looked too obviously CGI, and I might have preferred a bit more use of practical effects vs CGI - like the loading dock sequence, and I would have liked a closer look at the a certain large creature (particularly the novel's description of the bugs hanging off it).

Oh, and the Mist, either the novella or the movie always reminds me of XET now, since I ripped off the idea for the Rutland TP, so I'm all nostalgic again.

Okay, let's start off with Jumper. I saw it, and I was, expectedly, very disappointed. Significant spoilers behind cut, both for the book and the movie, to some degree comparing and pointing out the differences.
( Read more... ) In short, the same old story, loved the book, hated the movie.

Second, let's go for Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles. Good episode on the whole, except for one BIG, obvious science flub (unless I'm mistaken, but I don't think I am) which really detracted things for me. (not major spoilers, but some for the recent ep)
( Read more... )

Now let's move onto Stargate Atlantis, "Kindred". Minor spoilers, but I'm not going too in depth.
( Read more... )

And we'll wrap it up with some two-for-one Book Foo...
Finished: Woken Furies, by Richard K. Morgan
Started: The Forever War, by Joe Haldeman (reread)

Thoughts behind cut, non-spoilery. ( Read more... )

Finished: Otherland, Vol 1, by Tad Williams
Started: Jumper, by Steven Gould (reread, to get the taste of the movie out of my head)

I'm not going to cut my thoughts to keep this short: It was interesting enough that I'm going to read the next book in the series, and probably the rest of it unless it starts to suck fast.

Let's start with the recent Stargate Atlantis episode, "Midway". Some relatively significant spoilers behind the cut.
( Read more... )

I also finally got around to rewatching Terminator 2. So yeah, the timeline problems with the movie series are clear. What was a surprise to me though was that T2 wasn't even able to stick to its _own_ timeline. ( Read more... )

Still, I still believe T2 was the best of the series. It's not perfect, but it's quite good. It manages to avoid some big pitfalls. ( Read more... )

So, posting a bunch of random stuff again...

Is it just me or does "Vantage Point" look like on of those crappy "go through the same story from different people's points of view" type plots that every TV series in existence eventually does one episode based on the concept if they last long enough. If so, isn't that, as a movie plot, in the 'done to death' category?

Speaking of movies, the more I see commercials for Jumper the more I'm convinced I'm going to be disappointed in how much they changed from the book, to make it worse. It's kinda killed off my interest in seeing it.

It should be come as no surprise to my flist that I'm a man who shuns reality and lives deeply in fantasy. When I'm not watching TV or movies (which are often fantastical or SF in nature), I'm often working out story ideas or SF concepts in my head, or daydreaming around a SFish concept in a Walter Mitty way. These daydreams go back and forth, certain ones repeat every once in a while after a break, sometimes I do several different ones in a day. Lately though I've been stuck on the last man on Earth scenario. ( Read more... )

Looks like the Writer's Strike may be winding down. Yay. Hope it lasts past the initial 'back to work while we vote on the actual deal' and hope it's a good deal for them, since they deserve it. Edit to add: They officially voted to end the strike, at least until they have a chance to review and vote on the deal. So writers are back to work tomorrow.

Speaking of writing, done a writing cycle. Started a new story and managed to finish it... except I hate it. I still like the idea, and maybe one or two of the beats, but I don't like how it turned out and if I want to use it I'll probably have to write it all over again from scratch. And I'm not even sure how I'd start. So, kind of a good news bad news situation. Oh well.

I've been feeling a little iffy for the last week or so. It's odd, sometimes I feel fine, but often at some point during the day I feel dizzy and very very slightly nauseous. It's irritating, but I suppose it's better than being actually sick. Although sometimes I wish sickness would come and get it over with rather than these shadows of it coming and going regularly.

One of the few forums I hang out at closed suddenly. Most of the people knew it was coming (though not quite so suddenly) and so there's a backup getting in place for the people who hang there, but still, end of an era, of sorts.

Doctor Who Fandom Meme/Survey, stolen from locker_monster.. ( Read more... )

Thoughts on yesterday's Terminator, the Sarah Connor Chronicles. Slightly spoilery, also with an answer from one of the producers that some Terminator fans have wondered about since the second episode about a potential 'mistake'. ( Read more... )

Finally to end on a random note completely different from all the rest, I have been craving spiciness lately a lot more than usual (I always enjoy it). Also, I've been craving trying something _different_ than all the usual stuff I try. I am considering getting a bottle of Jerk BBQ sauce when my current BBQ sauce of choice (chipotle) runs out, to perhaps satisfy a little of both at once.

I think we'll start off with some Book Foo.

Finished: The Best of Interzone (short story collection)
Started: Otherland, by Tad Williams (tentative choice, subject to change)

Thoughts behind the cut, not terribly spoilery becuase it's a short story collection. ( Read more... )

Random rant. You know, if someone hasn't picked up their cell phone after you calling them for more than half an hour straight? They might not be there. Particularly if they're at work. But somebody uninvolved might be in the vicinity of the cell phone and not appreciate the words "I wanna lie dowwwwwn in a beeed of roses!" repeated on an endless loop every 3 seconds while you try. The rule is if you can't reach them in a minute, you try again every 5 (you can constant call a landline if you like, in an emergency)

Oh, and my childhood suffered a severe blow, as I watched the animated movie Dragonlance: Dragons of Autumn Twilight and it was... so bad. (not really any spoilers except in general how they differed from the books)
( Read more... )

Really not much to say lately, but a couple random things...

Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles is tonight. At least the pilot is, which I've already seen, but let's face it, until the strike's over TV's mostly going to be a dead zone from now on (except a few series burning off their last couple of episodes), so I might as well watch it again. I'm really looking forward to seeing the next ep, tomorrow. I made some icons of the first ep months ago, I'll probably post them on my master icon page after it airs.

I actually watched T3 last night, again. For some reason when the Terminator movies are on, any of them, if there's nothing else pressing on I'll usually watch them. Now, I know T3 was roundly hated by most T-fans, and I do think it was far inferior to T2, but I find it has a certain charm to it, despite its big flaws. (spoilers, including for the ending)
( Read more... )

Some Book Foo...
Finished: The Paradox of the Sets, by Brian Stableford
Started: The Depths of Time by Roger McBride Allen

( Read more... )

Also saw Stargate Atlantis... decent episode, a bit predictable at times (I could see plot points being set up for later). Good to see them doing something with that character. Heh, the badguys thought of the same plan from the last episode that I did, although that doesn't totally excuse the goodguys not thinking of it.

And a few memes:

A couple survey memes from firefox27, probably already done them, but why not again... One Word Meme and Layers of Me
( Read more... )

Stolen from kissingdaylight...

The Mayfly Project
Sum up 2007 in 24 words:

Much the same as 2006, with more writing. Tried NaNo for the first time, finished halfway through November. Moved once, was hell. Otherwise stable.

Speaking of Nano, I'm in my first writing cycle since before NaNo started (since I take December off from writing to the numbers, and NaNo was a single project). Not going too bad... it's been a little harder to get going but I'm still on schedule for each day's work. Working on two different short stories, while tossing ideas around for a third that has an amusing concept but I'm not sure where to work a story around it yet. Unfortunately I'm near to running out of steam on both the other two stories, so I might have to turn back to older work until I figure out exactly where I'm going with them, what the perfect ending is, etc, else I'll just be writing dross.

Major spoilers behind the cut, both for the movie and for the book that inspired it.

Short version: LAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAME.

( Read more... )

Vincent Price's The Last Man on Earth remains the best adaptation of I Am Legend. Not perfect, but still the best.

So, as mentioned last entry, watched Dawn of the Dead last night. Actually I watched a bit of the original Night of the Living Dead yesterday too, but was doing other things so didn't pay attention.

Anyway, as they occasionally do, my thoughts turned to zombies. In particular, Dawn of the Dead got me thinking about Shaun of the Dead (because of their similar sounding names), which is a british Zombie Movie, not just because it's set there but because it feels that it has sort of a completely different spirit to the American zombie films. The next logical (if that word can be used to describe my thought process) step to the thought, especially considering that Dawn was filmed in Canada, would be "What would a Canadian Zombie Film Be?"

So, just for some random, idle, Sunday fun, let's start to plot out the Great Canadian Zombie Film, tenatively titled "Eh? of the Dead!"

I think the first thing is that it has to be set in winter.
( Read more... )

(Canadians on my flist encouraged to participate and contribute their own ideas, or really anybody who wants to)

10 Questions, the Answers to Which I Will Genuinely Find Interesting
Stolen from greektoomey
Instructions:

[H]ere's what I'd like to see: answer the questions, here in the comments thread, or in your own journal. You don't have to answer them all. To perpetuate the meme, you could either re-post my questions in your journal and ask your friends-list, or, if you don't like my questions, you could make a post including these instructions and replacing some or all of my 10 questions with questions that you're really interested in seeing people answer.

1. If a magical wish-granting genie offered you a shoe-box and told you that whatever you wanted most that would fit inside that box would be what you'd find upon opening the lid, what would be in your box?

2. Who did you want to be when you were a kid? Who do you want to be now?

3. If you could ask your friends, family, partner(s), co-workers, or even other people on the street to change the way they interacted with you in one respect in order to make your life better, what would you ask them to change?

4. If you were to make the one change in your habits, behaviour, or lifestyle that be most likely to make your life better, what would you change?

5. What stops you from getting what you want out of life?

6. What's the one thing that has happened to you that has done the most towards making you stronger, better, and more capable?

7. What skill or talent do you most wish that you had?

8. Do you have any skills or talents that seemed useless or silly to you at first, but you now are glad that you have? What are they?

9. What one thing in the world are you most in love with right now?

10. If your life were a movie, what genre would it be in? Would you prefer to live a life that would make a different type of film?

My answers: ( Read more... )

Watched Dawn of the Dead last night. Still prefer Shamblers to Runners, but the movie was enjoyable on the whole, save a couple annoying moments of characters being too stupid to live. Have some more thoughts on zombies, but will save for another post I think. Still, the movie gave my good, zombilicious dreams. Well, semi-zombilicious. Mostly the dreams involved evacuating Earth from an unnamed emergency. I think the emergency might have been zombies, but they never actually appeared, just worries about a sickness. Also, we evacuated through wormholes. I managed to get a goatload (yes, a goatload) of my stuff through the gate before the last portal closed.

And, finally, Book Foo.

Finished: Slow River, by Nicola Griffith
Started: Glasshouse, by Charles Stross

Thoughts on Slow River behind the cut. Some mild spoilers. Overall enjoyed it.
( Read more... )

Getting down to the last of the 'easy' Nebula reads. Of the ones left, 1 is a book I might have read anyway (Haldeman's Camoflauge), 1 is a book that I might have read but have never been able to find in used bookstores (Silverberg's A Time of Changes), and the rest are all either fantasy, Part X in a Series I have no real interest in, or both. So it'll be a bit of a slog to the finish line. But I'm getting closer.

Cause nothing was interesting this week. Work was okay, though was feeling a bit dizzy.

Anyway, Veronica Mars Season 3 DVD's been released, and for those who haven't got it yet, and still want to see the "Season 4 Veronica in the FBI Pilot", here (part 2). Kind of cool to see, and some moments rocked, but I still felt it was a missing something, but presumably it would have been better if they had more time to prepare it. I still would have loved to see it.

In other news, Supernatural was fun last night. And Pushing Daisies tonight (which I saw yesterday) was also fun. Charlie from Heroes was a guest star!
Heroes this week was okay, though perhaps focusing on too many plotlines. PB was decent. Didn't care for the last 2 Atlantises too much. And, well, that's about all of note.

Edit: And a new trailer for The Mist, one of my favorite King short stories/novella. And here's more trailers for Will Smith's adaptation of I Am Legend.

Finished: Pandora's Star, by Peter F. Hamilton
Started: Judas Unchained, by Peter F. Hamilton

It's the first and second half of the same series, so really I'm at the midpoint, but some non-spoilery thoughts behind the cut anyway.
( Read more... )

Oh, and for anyone participating in NaNoWriMo who wants one, here's a NaNoWriMo Friending Meme.

Star Trek movie casting started out so well, but now they seem to be getting people who don't really (to me) seem anything like the original characters, visually, so I'm getting kinda mehish about the whole thing. We'll see again when more information and/or trailers start to get out.

TV's been okay but nothing's really wowed me this week. Though I will note I finally put Boston Legal out of its misery - I've been sort of casually watching it since it started, not loving it but liking at least certain elements of it enough to continue. But this year, Supernatural airs here the same time slot (5 days delayed from the normal time, but whatever), so I'm watching that instead. I suppose I could just DL supernatural and keep watching BL, but... I just don't care enough about BL.

Speaking of time schedule conflicts, my VCR seems to be slowly dying, the playback of new recorded shows is not good (so I assume the problem's in the record head). Won't bother getting it repaired, or replaced for that matter... might as well just start downloading the shows I want to keep or that conflict, but still it's a bit of an irritation for when I want to record something 'on the spot'. Maybe I'll see if I can track down a VCR head cleaner tape (do they still even make those?) and give that a whirl.

And speaking of downloading, I'm finished my Old School Doctor Who watching for the season. Stopped at Revenge of the Cybermen. Baker definitely rocks, blowing Pertwee away, even if the stories for the most part haven't been all that great. Also saw Davros for the first time - previously I'd only heard about him. Not all that impressed, at least not yet. Anyway, I'll pick up more in the summer dead season, maybe make a big dent in Baker or even move on to the next guy.

Lil more depressed than usual lately, I find. No particular cause, except the whole longing for impossible things, but that's about par for the course. *shrug*

No comic day due to delays from Thanksgiving. I'll get them tomorrow. Work was okay, on time and didn't take too long either.

Had leftover ham and potatos, turnips, carrots, stuffing from Thanksgiving. Which was okay, except that about half the people who were supposed to be there weren't for one reason or another.

Here's a trailer for the movie Jumper, based on one of my favorite books. Trailer looks decent, but I think they changed way too much from the book for me to be entirely satisfied.

Finished: Stations of the Tide, by Michael Swanwick (Nebula Winner)
Started: 20th Century Ghosts, by Joe Hill

First, thoughts on Stations. Short form: Okay, a bit 'not my thing'. Not much spoilers behind the cut though. ( Read more... )

Okay, now. 20th Century Ghosts, written by one of the sons of Stephen King (the book doesn't mention that anywhere, I just remember hearing about it elsewhere) is a collection of short stories. I just got it today. In the mail. For free. Yay, free book! What happened was a while back I signed up for HarperCollins (Canada)'s First Look Program, where in order to get some advance reviews of some of their books, they send a few of them out readers who sign up to their program for free. Only Canadians, of course, but other countries might have similar programs you could look into. Not a lot of their offerings had interested me so far, but this one did, so I requested it. I hadn't heard anything so I assumed they didn't choose me for it (they select who gets one of however many they send out randomly from the people who request it), but I got it in the mail today. Advanced Reader's Edition. So since I just finished a book I decided to put it next in rotation. I say again, yay for free books!

Oh, and the other day I finally watched Batman Begins for the first time. Spoilers behind the cut, even though I'm probably the last comic fan to have not seen it.
( Read more... )

So, today I saw my mom, who was in town. We went out to lunch at the Pickle Barrell.
A reasonably nice visit, though a bit short. The dinner itself was also good. We started with an appetizer plater, which had some fried calamari, 'tex mex spring rolls', mozzerella sticks, satay chicken skewers, and possibly a couple other things. I had some of all of it. For my main course I had a 'red thai curry stir fry' (with chicken and shrip), which at first was disappointly not curry-tasting, but once I got to the rice at the bottom it much improved, and so overall it was pretty good. And for dessert I had a piece of plain cheesecake with cherry sauce, with was mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm(drool).

Since the restaurant was in an area of town I don't get too much, I stayed after and did some shopping... they had a used bookstore right by it. Unfortunately, there was nothing at the used bookstore I wanted. But they also had a regular bookstore and I didn't want to go home with nothing, so I picked up Accelerando, by Charles Stross.

Speaking of books, just learned today that the author of Jumper, one of my most reread books, had done another book int he universe, "Jumper: Griffin's Story". Apparently the movie will be including a second character who has the teleport ability, and of course he didn't exist in the books, but the author decided to write him in. Or something. I hope it's in continuity with the previous books somehow that makes sense. I'll be buying it, though I'll probably wait for the paperback, which is expected to be out the same time as the movie is (February 2008).

In other news, I don't really have a lot of other news. On a writing cycle, working mostly on something for a workshop so hopefully I'll get it done and post it. It's my first attempt at a steampunk, or at least a story with steampunkish elements. I'm quite enjoying it, or at least how the elements fit together in my head. When it gets to try to putting it on paper (or putting it to magnetism as the case may be), it all starts to suck, but hey, nothing new there.

Also, my back's been a bit off the last couple days. Not as bad as it was a couple months back, but around the same area, so I worry. It started at work, where I got a little twinges of pain when I tried to lift. Not a scream of pain like when it all went to hell, but just a "whoah, there cowboy" (yes, my back refers to me as cowboy. I don't know why, I just accept it. My feet call me "the pressing weight", and my heart calls me "The Gathering Storm"). So I took it slow and easy and it never really got _bad_. I'm sure it's just a minor thing, but, well, I'm in the mood to ramble on a bit, and that's part of why I'm writing this entry. So deal with it.

I was going to do a 'what I've been reading and watching on tv' segment, but I haven't fully organized my thoughts on them so I'll save it for another time.

Apparently Joss Whedon's long-talked about "Ripper" idea (featuring Giles from Buffy) for the BBC is very close to coming together, as a 90 minute movie. This and other projects and potential projects he's talked about here.

Also, looked at the trailer for Iron Man they played at comiccon and... actually I'm rather impressed. I've never really been an Iron Man fan, and actually kind of like him as the villain he is now in the comics. But it looks like the movie could be cool.

Edit: Oh, and bad news it seems for Farscape. This article gives a bit more info on those 'webisodes'. No info specifically on the cast, but the length is determined: Each will be between 3 and 6 minutes in length. Translation: Almost completely skippable to me unless most of the cast returns (in which case 10 webisodes might add up to the equivalent of 1 episode - nice, but only if it's actually a direct continuation).

And there was another round of the Writing Workshop I'm in over at the BKV cabal. This one was based on a one word prompt, "LOST". I didn't really put a lot of time into this one, so it's not really my best work, but just for the sake of tradition, it's posted behind the cut. The format was specified 5 pages script or 500 words prose, and since I don't really like working in short word counts in prose (unless it's _very_ short, like the 100 word stories), I went with a comic script format. ( Read more... )

That's about all I want to talk about right now, I think. There's a 'works in progress' meme I saw that might be interesting, but since I have so many it'd put too much effort to put together now, so I'll do it another time maybe.

Finished another writing cycle. Technically speaking, I only wrote just over 7000 words instead of my aimed for 8000, but I still made quota. How's that? Well, because I give myself a 1000 word bonus for finishing. Yes, I actually finished one. Complete narrative from beginning to end. And, oddly enough, it was the one that I last reported as being potentially unsalvagable. I managed to work through the problems. Of course, it still needs to be heavily edited (my biggest stumbling block now that I've actually started writing regularly, I can't seem to get up the drive to edit), but I've finished at least. So yay me!

Book Foo:
Finished: Rainbows End, by Vernor Vinge
Started: The Forever Machine, by Mark Clifton and Frank Riley

Thoughts about Rainbows End behind the cut. Minor, vague spoilers.
( Read more... )

There are still two outstanding quotes from my movie quotes quiz, that nobody has yet guessed. They are:
2. "It's a very rare person who is taken for what he truly is."
10. "It happens sometimes. Friends come in and out of our lives like busboys in a restaurant." - Stand By Me, guessed by angelophile.

I actually figured these would be fairly easy. But, since nobody got it, hints:
#2: Comes from a movie that I know many of my flist knows, because we've quoted from it before. It's animated.
#10: Comes from a movie based on a short story by a famous author. The movie (but not the story) is titled after a song.

Speaking of the quotes quiz, pulling a quote from Heathers inspired me to go out and dig the movie out again. Still enjoy it, and it made me make a few icons for it:
( Read more... )

In completely unrelated Veronicas, Veronica Mars tonight.

Found this while going through some of my old entries. Was fun, so I figured I'd do it again. Pass on the meme if you like.

Here are quotes from 10 movies I like. Comment and guess the movie (looking it up is cheating, of course). If you do, I'll edit the post to mark it guessed.

1. "Never trust a beautiful woman. Especially one who's interested in you." - X2: X-Men United, guessed by ciaracat.
2. "It's a very rare person who is taken for what he truly is."
3. "I want to be just like you. I figure all I need is a lobotomy and some tights." - The Breakfast Club, guessed by foxfyre
4. "You've got an overdeveloped sense of vengeance. It's going to get you into trouble someday." - The Princess Bride, guessed by ciaracat.</b>
5. "I'm a monster. What I do is evil. I have no illusions about it, but it must be done." - Serenity, guessed by occamsnailfile
6. "Wiping out the human race? That's a great idea. That's great. But more of a long-term thing. I mean, first we have to focus on more immediate goals." - 12 Monkeys, guessed by fiddlersgreen
7. "Ah, now you're talking. I can be up for that. I've already started underlining meaningful passages in her copy of Moby Dick, if you know what I mean." - Heathers, guessed by escap1974
8. "Just doing my part for the deconstruction of America" - The Faculty, guessed by escap1974
9. "I got the better end of the deal. I only lent you my body - you lent me your dream." - Gattaca, guessed by lyssachan
10. "It happens sometimes. Friends come in and out of our lives like busboys in a restaurant." - Stand By Me, guessed by angelophile (in subsequent post)

Oh, and new Veronica Mars tonight, woo.

First, it's mighty cold outside. But I am a brave, manly, Canadian man, so at 6am I walked the 40 minutes to work (and then 2 hours later, 40 minutes back) in -16 degree weather (-27 wind chill). (All values in sensible Celsius, not your crazy Fahrenheit)

Secondly, I just thought I'd get up a soapbox a bit. The Last Unicorn is coming out on a special 25th anniversary DVD on Feb 6. The DVD will be remastered and such. If anyone on my flist or anyone happening to stumble on the post, has intention of buying it, I heartily suggest you get it from this site, as opposed to ANYWHERE else. If you buy it anywhere else, Peter S. Beagle, writer of the Last Unicorn, will get nothing. Buying it from the link I provided will give him half the purchase price (and you can get it autographed, too). He's been fighting a legal battle for some time to get his due compensation from Granada Media, the company that owns the film.

I'm probably not able to get the DVD for a while, but I might after I move and have a better idea of my finances.

First of all, I'd like to wish a happy Eid to those on my flist who celebrate it. Well, to everyone really- whether you celebrate it or not you can still have a happy one, like Christmas.

Okay, movie foo: X3. As I mentioned a few days ago, I watched it. First, and I cannot stress this enough, COLOSSUS DOES NOT HAVE SILVER HAIR IN METAL FORM. ANY FILM IN WHICH COLOSSUS IS DEPICTED AS HAVING SILVER HAIR IN METAL FORM IS INSTANTLY A FAILURE. I'm sorry, but it is. This is non-negotiable. It just looks AWFUL. Metallic black, fine. Silver, no.

More spoilery thoughts behind the cut.
( Read more... )

Book Foo!

Finished: Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban by J.K. Rowling,
and Olympos by Dan Simmons

No quotes this time around because they were fairly long books and even when I found quotes I kinda liked I forgot the page numbers and didn't want to go digging. Some minor spoilery thoughts behind the cut. But I'll give you my 'back of the book review' of Olympos right here:

'If you're interested in the capabilities of penises of the future and those of Gods 15 feet tall or higher, than this is the book for you!'

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Started: Cell, by Stephen King (Fridays and Sundays)
A Fire In the Sun by George Alec Effinger (sequel to When Gravity fails).

I've only gotten a few pages into Cell and it really reminds me how much I want a good post-zombie-apocalypse TV series. Someone should make the Walking Dead into a TV show, I've heard it's good nad I don't want to read the books cause I have a horrible bias against black and white comics.

This week I got 4 books:
Daredevil #86 (action book full of tension and with a great ending)
Runaways #17 (noooooooo! But a good issue nonetheless!)
X-Factor #8 (some surprising progress in this issue and funny moments)
Young Avengers #12 (all around a fun book)

Great week all around.

Full reviews are up at my comic reviews site for anyone interested.

For lunch had a pizza pocket (deluxe) before I headed out.

Work was okay, a little later than I'd hope but on the plus side
that meant another Social Interaction to report. ( Read more... )

Also, some news on a Dragonlance Animated Film. Yeah, I know Dragonlance was heavily derivative of Tolkien and targetted for undiscriminating RPG fans, but there's a squeeing 12-year-old boy inside of me that's really excited about this. The cynical 28-year-old boy that forms the outer shell is amused that one of the voice actors refers to Goldmoon as a 'Native American' character. Uh, no. You see, she'd only be Native American if Dragonlance took place in America. Just like Black Panther is not one of Marvel's foremost African-American characters - he's just African. Also, I'm not sure I see Michael Rosenbaum as Tanis.

Senior Year Meme

Fill this out about your senior year of high school,

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And, since it's sorta school related I guess...

They've announced New Line bought the rights to an American remake of Battle Royale. It'll probably suck because that's what Hollywood does, but if it matches the Americanizezd movie I have in my head when I read the book, it'll be awesome. Actually when I finished reading the book I had some free time and a bit of an obsession and actually wrote up an americanized script just for my own amusement (very faithful to the book with just a couple changes mostly in scene scheduling), complete with renaming all the characters. Now that I'm rereading the book my mind constantly uses my names for the characters because it's easier for me to keep track of everybody that way. ;)
And because this is a school meme and I'm talking about BR, I'm including a superflous link back to my 'what I'd do in Battle Royale' post.

I've paid for a few months of LJ time. I've also completed my Runaways Mood Theme and implanted that.

First, the 6 Social Interaction Report. Not really a whole lot to report, but before the truck arrived I did exchange a few words with someone I didn't know who was getting ready for her shift. Mostly commiserating over Daylight Savings Time (which sucks, btw... Damn you October-Me, you screwed me again!). Also had a few words with pixie-faced-girl about the same thing. Still, relatively pleasant and I didn't embarass myself (that I know of) so yay.

So the other day I watched Cube Zero. That's right, first there was Cube, then Cube 2: Hypercube, and now, Cube Zero. Cube was a great 'one big idea' movie about a bunch of strangers who wake up in a strange complex full of identical looking rooms in the shape of a Cube, each with one exit on each face (including floor and ceiling). They have no idea how or why they got there, nobody trusts each other, and oh yeah, some of the rooms contain deathtraps. It faltered a little towards the end but the idea was great. Hypercube wasn't bad as a sequel (extending the idea to a four dimensional structure), though not as good as the original. Still I liked the idea enough that when I heard about Cube Zero I wanted to see it.

Cube Zero's described as a prequel, although IMHO it's best described as an alternate take on the same subject matter. I'd rather not consider it part of 'Cube Continuity' if there is such a thing. It's the weakest of the three, but does some interesting things.

( Spoilers and thoughts behind the cut, but nothing really big - not the resolution or anything you don't find out in the first half or so )
Oh, and also semi-movie-related. The other day I happened to hear that they were making a sequel to 28 Days Later called 28 Weeks Later. The day after, I had a dream of what the plot would be - basically, the people from the first movie, but in America now since it didn't spread there... at least not at first, until some terrorist group/apocalypse nutjobs deliberately released it in public in America. The people from the first movie go from being celebrities for having survived, to having to deal with a new burgeoning crisis and try and get out of the city (New York) before a nuke's dropped on it.

Finally got around to seeing this, since it was on TV last night so I taped it.

Overall, fairly enjoyable. Probably not a movie I'd want to see again and again, but I'm glad I saw it once, anyway. And a surprise to see the Doctor pop up in it (Eccleston). There are a few bits where people do annoyingly stupid things just because they need to in order to get an scary action bit (in my last entry I mentioned about how it's okay when teen characters do this, but I'm much less forgiving about adult characters - that's the case here), but it wasn't too bad.

The TV station played both the regular ending and the alternate ending (luckily I decided to keep taping past the credits). (cut for spoilers, yeah it may be silly for a 3 year old movie but hey, I hadn't seen it until now and maybe you haven't either)
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Anyway, rather fun.

In other movieish news, here's a short (6.5 minutes) film, a documentary-style film of an alternate-history where extraterrestrial refugees land in South Africa). Interesting viewing.

This morning I watched The Faculty again. It's odd, I'd never call it one of my favorite movies, and yet somehow, every time it's on, unless there's something else much more pressing to watch, I find myself watching it (or, in this case, recording it last night and watching it this morning, since it was late and I was sleepy). It's not the greatest movie in the world, and there are huge plot-holes and an ending that seems a little out of place IMHO. But I guess it's just fun, and, as is the case with a lot of my favorites, it facilitates 'what I'd do if I were in that situation'. Plus it's got a fun cast (this time around I realized that Marybeth is the same person who later would play Daisy Adair on Dead Like Me).

It also occured to me that there seems to be a natural cross point to combine 'High School movie/series' and almost anything else, and when done well I really seem to enjoy it. ( Read more... )

Yesterday I finished Battle Royale, by Koushun Takami. For those who don't know, it's a novel about a class of Grade 9 students in a fascist Japan who are randomly selected to compete in a yearly competition in which they all must fight until there is only one survivor. In short, I really enjoyed the book, far more than I expected to. My official Battle Royale review is here, but I have some more thoughts both on the premise, and translations to other media, that I'll put before the cut tag because they spoil some aspects of the book (and movie, I guess) - they are very minor (IMHO) spoilers though, rather than any big details like how it ends.

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Now, since this is one of the reasons I enjoyed the book so much (because it encouraged such speculation in me), I have to go into my own little thoughts about what I would do if I was in the situation. (Some spoilers, mainly for things that are in the book's concept rather than the specifics of plot, but mostly spoilers for my Grade 9 life. If you're planning on reading the book of my life or watching the inevitable movie, you may be spoiled for the parts about Grade 9! ;))

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If only it took place in a post-apocalyptic wasteland with a robot partner, it would be the Best Movie Ever!

I'm speaking of The Faculty, which is on tv here right now. There aren't a lot of movies that I can stand to watch more than a couple times within, say, a few years. Most of the time if I know what's going to happen when (beyond the general plotline) I just can't bring myself to get too involved in watching it... but this is one of those films I can. I dunno, it's just fun and gives great 'What would you do in the situation' mental play.

"I'm not an alien, I'm discontent."

So, last night I was watching "A.I.: Artificial Intelligence" on TV. I hadn't seen it before. Overall, I quite liked it... occasionally drifted too much into being too much about looking great, for my tastes. Maybe a bit too long. And I hated hated hated hated hated hated the ending. If they ended it maybe 5-10 minutes early, it'd have been great, but I hated what they did with it and will have to mentally edit in my own ending to be at all satisfied with the movie.

Anyway, the movie brought back to mind a few issues about artificial life. ( Read more... )

So, in general, I was just curious about the views of people reading this on the issue. Maybe it's in part self-selecting, because probably a high percentage of my friends list is a fan of SF or comics and so are routinely exposed to artificial characters who are treated as human.

Watched Gattaca again tonight on TV. Really enjoy the movie, in general. Possibly one of the best SF movies of the 90s, and maybe even of all time, IMHO.

Of course, every time I watch it, one thing sticks out...

(Spoilers ahead, + TMI-ish guy stuff)
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