(Lyrics by 30 Seconds To Mars – Kings and Queens. On the one hand I’m a total sucker for this song and it’s been getting a lot of play time by me as of late. On the other hand I completely disagree with the lyrics. We *WERE* the kings and queens of promise. I don’t know about you but I for one don’t think my promise was still in the past but still exists and is being pursued in all areas of my life. Of course that could just be me. The image? Well it just goes along with the what I just typed!)

Life:
Life has of course been keeping me busy as of late. With Leah and I being officially dating more of my free time has disappeared (I’m not complaining! My free time being replaced I have absolutely 0 issues with, that was just pointed out for explanation) so I’ve been in a rush trying to get ahead on everything under the sun. It being January my birthday was at the beginning of the month with a nice turnout of everyone coming over for a party. Had the full crew of friends over and good times were had by all. Apparently even more so by those who stayed the night and were treated to a huge breakfast that was clearly enjoyed by all. On the fun side of things I was also at BBQ Night which is a regular Sunday activity in Leah’s group of friends – food and booze? Always good times. Finally in case you missed it I booked a vacation which is my first real one in nearly 4 years. Christ you’d think with how much I love to relax that wouldn’t have been the case.

Project wise I am starting a new blog entitled The Write Start with my friend Jason Zajdel that will focus on Blogging, Networking, Freelancing, Social Media, and Online Tools. All of these have been a huge interest to me for years and Jason the past year so an outlet to write on them? Bonus. There isn’t much I can officially say on projects past this but there are still a slew in the works at various stages in development. Hell, 5 are technically up though I just am not advertising them until I have the look of each of them down.

Of course not all of life has been great in the world of Stu. My mother was in the hospital last week after having a horrible migraine, a blackup immediately after, and short term memory loss. There is still 4 hours of that day she can’t fully recall and that’s terrifying. The worst part is they have no idea what caused it. Supposedly everything overly dangerous and life threatening has been ruled out, but how can they be totally sure if they don’t know the cause? Here’s hoping modern medicine can figure it out.

Movies:
This is the worst part of not making an update in nearly a month. Having watched over 10 movies I have to write a mini review of all of them and I know for a fact I’m leaving out 5-15 movies.

Jennifer’s Body was Diablo Cody’s first stab at horror. (See what I did there? Stab at horror?) After such great reviews of Juno and the fact she seems to be in touch with and a huge fan of horror in general there was high expectations on where this film was going to go. What actually happened though? Well that would be a whole lot of disappointment had by many. Aside from the Jennifer’s Body Poster ripping off of True Blood’s poster there was just a lack of both direction in the movie and the plot really making a lot of sense. I won’t argue though that with how painful some of it was – it had some great lines. The stand out one had to do with two members of a boy band talking and one asking if the other wanted to keep being a failure or “Do you wanna be the guy from Maroon 5?”

Circle of Eight tells the story of a girl who moves into a new condo when everything goes to hell. It is a tale about karma, life, and death. It is also severely messed up and unless your paying attention will easily miss out on a few key aspects on where the movie is going. I would absolutely not recommend this one as a buy and to my horror loving friends who love a very STRANGE way of telling a story to the movies they watch I would suggest a rent. It’s not at all a great movie but it IS an original movie. As someone who loved both independent and original movies I did enjoy it, I just don’t think most people I know really would.

Cars is another of Pixar’s adventures into combining a kids animated movie with a mixture of a plot feasible for an adult audience to enjoy. It’s also, in my opinion, the worst of the Pixar movies. Now I’m not saying that it’s bad because Pixar has been pure gold to date on every movie they’ve had being enjoyable. It just wasn’t as enjoyable as anything else that they’ve done. Perhaps I’m a little biased having seen both Wall-E and UP in the past year, this is one of their older works and of course everyone gets better as they have additional practice at their trade. I think it was just the idea of talking cars I couldn’t really get into or truly feel for the characters on screen.

Blindness took the ideology of a post-apocalyptic outbreak movie, ran with it, and threw in one major twist. The disease spreading across the world does NOT kill you. What it does for everyone who is infected is makes them blind. It’s the tale of how one woman is still able to see in an age where the majority of the population can’t. How people survive and how those who are strong are willing to pray on the innocent. While there are a few parts of the movie that just disgusted me in what occurs, both on the side of people and the government, it was a really well put together movie. If you enjoy outbreak movies, post-apocalyptic films, or anything even remotely similar to them you will love this movie.

The Final Destination is the 3D trip into the world of the Final Destination franchise. It is apparently by the title and interviews THE Final Destination, no more, finale time, game over man – game over. I really hope this proves to be the case because it is a franchise that relies on a single gimmick that got rather stale quickly. I don’t know if it was because you feel you are watching the same movie over and over again or bad writing but this was the final nail in the coffin for me as if it didn’t end here it still would have been my last stop with the franchise.

Forget Me Not was a pretty original horror movie with the common genres that are currently coming out. You don’t see a lot these days on movies that involve curses and specially not ones that involve curses which are so original. What happens when a group of friends start to disappear one at a time? Usually there would be an investigation, however what happens when no one but one of them remembers them after they vanish? This is the story of a woman whose friends go missing one at a time and no one in the circle of friends remember the others. Of course this leads to everyone thinking that she is losing her grip on sanity even though it is quickly made clear to the viewer that she isn’t. What is causing the disappearances? Can she stop them before everyone she knows is gone for good?

Primer was one of the most original science fiction movies I have seen in a long time. My usual choice of science fiction takes place in space though this one? It takes place in the near future where two friends are able to invent a device that lets them travel through time. They start using this technology to at first increase their wealth but quickly start to change events to suit their wants and desires. Time travel is a tricky thing involving paradoxes of all sorts and this story is no different as it quickly spirals out of control into a story of both confusion and betrayal. Anyone who likes a twist in their science fiction will love this look at morality and the twisting of time.

Daybreakers is the second best vampire film to come out in the past few years. Obviously Let The Right One In is still my favorite but this is an extremely close second bringing in a new twist on the entire vampire genre of horror. Set in a noir future where vampires have taken over the world the human population is quickly running out. With blood supplies decreasing the society itself has a huge problem on it’s hands if a blood substitute cannot be found. What happens though when someone finds a way to ‘cure’ the disease that has inflicted society making everyone a vampire? When everyone can be turned back into a human is it truly a cure, or just another way to find food?

Couples Retreat which I was worried might fall into too much of a romantic comedy with the premise behind it proved to be entertaining the entire way through. When a group of friends that are all couples are at a party together one of them announce that they are possibly getting a divorce. The solution is a retreat dedicated on helping couples rebuild their marriages or relationships. While everyone is sold at the beauty of the vacation spot they are quickly shown that they were fooled into thinking they would all have a nice break and are all forced into couple’s therapy. With a ton of jokes and Vince Vaughn on his game for the first time in a few movies it was a slew of laughter and well worth the watch.

The Men Who Stare At Goats was Clooney’s most recent foray into a both strange and unique movie. Clooney plays a ‘mystical’ soldier from a secret armed force that the government created to use paranormal powers to fight any enemy of the United States. It is the most offbeat and oddly written ‘war movie’ that has been written and also a complete riot the whole way through. Add in Jeff Bridges as a soldier turned hippie turned soldier that runs the unit Clooney was in? It felt like a partial return of “The Dude” from The Big Lebowski and any fan of his performance there (who isn’t?) will get a constant kick out of this one everytime he’s on screen.

The Lovely Bones is Peter Jackson’s latest film and shows he can still flex his chops when it comes to putting together a well written movie with some amazing special effects. Now I’m writing that I loved this film from the viewpoint that I have NOT read the novel. Every reviewer and person I know that has said they didn’t enjoy the movie because it didn’t follow the book properly. So I’m kind of glad I haven’t read the book yet as I REALLY enjoyed this as a thriller. Plot, acting, visuals, everything was top notch. I feel bad that people who have read the book didn’t like it, though it does make me curious how well the book was written if people who have read it can’t stand the movie.

The Road is another one of those post apocalyptic movies I love so much. While it is never fully clear on what exactly caused the cities to be ruined and the human race to fall into such a horrible state of savagery. The tale follows a father trying to take his child across the country in search of a safe place to live. As they travel they follow the roads from the now fallen infrastructure and attempting to avoid everyone they find on them. The father and child are both good people but it shows the father progressively become more of a selfish and paranoid man as he strives to keep his child, the one person he loves most in the world safe.

The Stepfather is another one of the worst horror movies I have ever seen. With Jennifer’s Body and The Final Destination this was a trifecta of bad movies that did nothing but hurt. This was surprisingly the most enjoyable of the three because it wasn’t horrible. If they had chosen a bit differently on the casting it may have even ended up being enjoyable. Still though it suffered greatly from some bad dialogue in a few points and too much of random painful moments where it was hard to believe the acting as it felt a bit forced. It couldn’t have helped that I went into the film expecting to not enjoy it, the premise of a serial killer step father that has been avoiding detection and being photographed so he couldn’t be tracked down? Seems a bit too far fetched with the body count he apparently had.

Pride and Glory was both well written and surprising. Surprising in the fact that it took so long to see an Edward Norton film. A police drama that pit good cops against corrupt cops and problems within a police family a drama that sucked you in and didn’t let you stop watching until it came to the end. This film also kicked back into my mind the thought that Jon Voight needs to be in more movies with darker aspects to them as he really is a great actor and doesn’t receieve nearly as many projects as he should. Hell I don’t believe he’s been in anything since 24 and this is just a depressing thought as he’s getting on in age.

Yes, fine, The Fantastic Mr. Fox was a kid’s movie. However like a Pixar film it was an animated movie that was written to keep not just children but adults interested as well. Another film that involved George Clooney this month though this one was of course all just voice acting. On a side note anything Bill Murray is in these days, even as just a voice actor, you know has to be worth the watch. A completely underused style was used to show off the animation in this tale of a man (erm fox) learning to truly be a man (erm adult fox) and quit living in the past and actually grow up. Great moral tale and one that is almost subliminal with how well the story comes together.

A while lot of nothing new

(The above lyrics from from Rise Against – Audience of One and image is from the webcomic LilFormers and is brilliant. It has nothing to do with this post in any way shape or form but having grown up with both the cartoony pizza loving turtles and the darker comic based turtles I nearly died laughing from this. If you didn’t grow up with the Turtles and don’t get this don’t worry- I’m insane.)

So it’s been awhile since I’ve done my last update here. Surprisingly there hasn’t been as much media consumption as usual! While there has obviously been some you have to keep in mind that it has been just over a full month since my last “What Stu has been watching / reading / playing update.” So aside from this what HAVE I been doing? Well there was of course Terror in the Aisles 2 that I attended which was a complete blast all the way through. I spent some time hanging out with Rose before she went back to school. Spent a day hanging out with Leah while she was recovering from a late night of drinking which was a blast. Had Bryan and one of his friends over one of the nights Rose was here for watching a couple movies. Neil was gone for a week and a half and I had the place to myself which made me realize that it wasn’t that bad of a thing. On that note- our condo is going up on the market next month which means when looking for a new place to live I’m going to see what I can find out the south side, with indoor parking, that I can afford solo. It’ll clearly be a step down from where I’m living now but it’s that or I look for a new roommate as I don’t think Neil is planning on staying in the city when the condo is gone.

Rather light on the social life too. Where has all of my time gone? I’m honestly not sure! I have been half assed working out again lately but not enough to make a dent and while I know I’ve been working with a programmer for the new design on BuyZombie and made a few changes here (profile picture, added a contact form, and some minor things) it really doesn’t explain what exactly I’ve been up to. Maybe I’ve gone the Fight Club route and developed a split personality that’s running me around at night? Whose to say!

Movies
I was able to recently see the Chicago premiere of Trick ‘r Treat and can’t stress enough that this is a must buy movie for any horror fan. There aren’t many horror movies that actually focus on the holiday of Halloween itself, even the aptly named Halloween only took place ON the holiday and otherwise did not really concern itself with it. Here we have in it’s greatest form a movie based around ancient rituals of paganistic religions that were the origins of our present day trick or treat experience. Centering this masterpiece of fun horror is an entity known as Samhain whose entire purpose is to enforce that everyone follows the ‘rituals’ laid forth and punish those who didn’t.

On opening weekend of what is meant to be an epic new science fiction film I saw District 9 with Rose and Neil. Now I’m not going to say that District 9 wasn’t epic in scale. I’m not going to say it didn’t have an original plot because the concept while used before WAS used originally in this film. I’m not going to say how it ends was bad because I loved the way the movie ended up. My complaints are two- exactly. The first of these 2 are the main actor. I’m sorry I just couldn’t feel bad for him even with how things ended up. I was far too annoyed by his character to see feeling bad for him when the time came that you knew you should. Things happened to him that you HAD to feel bad for him and most probably did but I just couldn’t. I mainly wanted to hit him. The second problem? I felt the beginning was too long. I think I ONLY felt this because of the actor as well. I loved how they showed us what happened to society and why but couldn’t enjoy it while trying to drone out the lead actor.

So I was a ‘small’ GI-Joe fan growing up so when Leah picked that as one of our movies to go see I have to admit I couldn’t pass up the offer. I knew what I was in for before it began- a summer action flick that would partially murder my childhood memories of a beloved franchise. I can’t say they overly commercialized it since the franchise was created OFF of a toy line. The cartoon would have never existed if it weren’t a marketing tool for the toys. With that in mind I have to say I really did have fun with it. I was a little annoyed with a few key plot changes; Scarlet should have been torn between Duke and Snake eyes, The Baroness was never ‘good’, Destro never had to have his mind controlled to be part of Cobra (loved how they did the mask for it,) and Cobra Commander’s ‘mask’ was asstastic. With those complaints aside I really had a great time watching the movie. It was a summer popcorn filled flick with a perfect sequel ending. An over the top plot that paid off in spades for entertainment and I am fully looking forward to the eventual sequel.

The ONLY selling point I had ever really heard for Prozac Nation was that hey- you get to see Christina Ricci. Being male this of course intrigued me! The movie though is a great commentary on prescription drugs, depression, mental illness, being accepted, and what people will do to have fun. On top of all this it is based off of an actual auto-biography of the writer Elizabeth Wurtzel and how she both got through college and started writing. Well acted, character development, amazing shots, overall (even without a nude Christina Ricci) the movie was a good watch and easy to be drawn into wanting to know how she would end up and unable to avert your eyes away from the train wreck she was making of her life.

What set of movies would be complete without at least one horror movie, and a zombie flick at that? Boy Eats Girl fits the mold perfectly! This Irish made horror movie went with the general zombie outbreak idea of the dead coming back to life, spreading through bites that kill, and these dead eat humanity. This movie has been fitting in once again with the idea of intelligent zombies. I feel this trend, with how commonplace it is becoming, is one that is here to stay. While it does work in some situations the entire idea of a horde of mindless man eating undead who feel and think nothing past how to kill the next of us is still more fun to work with. Having to accept the mindless zombies the ending of this movie makes up for how badly the ‘cure’ for turning into a zombie is- a nonstop over the top gore fest that is absolutely ridiculous. If you don’t mind intelligent zombies and can get over the teen romance angle it’s a fun ride.

Now I haven’t heard this about The International so wait with me a moment here, be patient, I hated the movie. Now your going to wonder why on this since literally it had me enthralled and was one of the better reviewed films this year, even slipping partially under the radar. So why did I hate this movie? THE LAST 5 MINUTES felt completely rushed and not in line with the spirit of the movie. It was an easy out for the character, an easy out on how it made no difference, and just didn’t feel that it did the film justice. I literally could not stop watching the movie and enjoyed every second of the plot and felt betrayed by the ending of the film. I’m fine with a movie that wraps everything up at the end in a bow if it has no plans for a sequel but the ending has to fit with the lead up. Who was killed, how they were killed, and the little newspaper clippings all felt thoroughly rushed and uncreative. The agent we’re rooting for who has to ‘turn bad’ in order to get his way isn’t forced to follow through negating the entire set of events he set into motion and it pissed me off. If your character isn’t taking the moral high ground he should be forced to make his choice completely and not have it taken out of his hands. I clearly enjoyed everything else with how angry I am about this ending which no one else has had an issue with but I felt let down with such a great build up in plot.

Friday the 13′th Part 6-10. So basically what happened in these movies is Jason Voorhees goes around and kills a bunch of teenagers that are having sex, doing drugs, or just having fun. Shocking isn’t it? Jason Lives, The New Blood, Jason Takes Manhattan, The Final Friday, and Jason X all told the same story of Jason going on a rampage butchering the innocent. There was a few fun changes of leaving Crystal Lake to take a trip into Manhattan and in one instance space but there really isn’t much you can do with a slasher flick series based off of a man in a hockey mask who never talks. At least Freddy spoke which lent us some originality. I did love how they mixed it up a bit in the later movies but watching these through straight just ended up being painful. One at a time mixed in with other movies these are all acceptable (and I love how the dress and speech clearly show the time periods they were made in) but a Friday the 13th marathon will never again happen on my TV. (Tune in next time for another Horror franchise that I kill any self-interest in seeing to completion in one sitting!)

On her day of relaxing at my place after a night of heavy drinking I felt Leah needed something that was just mind numbing entertainment which can always be fulfilled by the man- Bruce Campbell. My Name is Bruce felt like the perfect fit for a lazy day with B movie greatness in every second that you can’t help but love (even for the B movie haters out there.) He’s never had a problem mocking himself on film but this one takes the cake with an all out fest of a… simpler… town unleashing a curse and kidnapping Bruce. Not him acting but kidnapping him as a B actor. It portrays how ‘wonderful’ his life is these days- divorced, living in a trailer park, being screwed over by his agent (figuratively of course… though literally with his ex-wife,) barely running car, and not being able to land a job past sequel after sequel of horrible B movies that he constantly is panned for. If you love horror movies, B movies, or Bruce Campbell this is one to pickup.

TV
“The Wire was one of the greatest shows on television.” Neil said. “You HAVE to watch the damn show right now” he said. So I did, Season 1 at least and fine I’ll admit it- Neil was right. A great plot, acting, character development, well shot scenes, a series on cops vs drug dealers, every single aspect is a selling point for me. So why have I taken so long to start watching it? I suppose it’s from being stubborn (does that surprise any of you?) as well as telling myself I didn’t want to start another series. Well this one is 6 seasons, Battlestar is over clearing up a spot, and most of my shows are coming up to their season finales if they haven’t already had them. Basically I was bored and out of excuses so decided to pick it up.

Bonus note: I’m also caught up with True Blood Season 2 aside from the finale which is tonight. I’ll do a quick writeup of what I felt about Season 2 in it’s entirety in my next post.

Games
Shadow Complex came out on the X-Box 360 and I’ve been slowly playing through it. The ONLY reason I haven’t beaten it yet is because I know I will not see another game like it for some time, if ever. Anyone who gets me talking about modern video games will know I will eventually lead up to complaining that there aren’t enough side scrollers these days. I clearly love first person shooters or I wouldn’t be playing Call of Duty 4 2 years after it’s release and eagerly awaiting the sequel, but my heart is with the classics. Side scrollers and 3/4th view games (Zelda) are what always did it for me and now, finally, with Shadow Complex I can play a side scroller that is worth of the classics. With a metroid style shooter feel, a map the size of the castle from Castlevania: Symphony of the Night, a level up system, AND modern graphics I’m hooked. I try to play for an hour or two at a time and while I know where the game can be beaten I haven’t fully explored the map yet and plan on doing so, slowly, before it comes to an end. I may never see another game styled in this manner that was made with such skill again. I need to enjoy it while I can.

Books
With everything else I’ve been slacking on doing you would think I would have finished more than 1 book. However no there was only one, however it was a great one! In The Woods by Tana French is a murder mystery that completely sucked me in. The writing style had me hooked from the get go and the character interaction between the two lead detectives on the case was eerily familiar to a few friendships I’ve had in the past. Add in the fact that there was a great mystery at the heart of it, character development, and a few twists along the way and yes I loved it. Oh did I mention one of the two detectives are from the town this murder happened in and seems to be related to the murder of two of his friends that he lived through as a child, the memories of which are locked away in his memory?

You See The Darnedest Things In Chicago…

But I’ve been told I can’t talk about what I saw last winter. So instead I’ll talk about life! As usual I’ve had a lot going on in life as usual since the last update because I take far too long in making any on this site. Hell it’s been over a month for an actual ‘everything that happens’ since I never was able to talk about going to Sal’s place for the 4th of July which involved seeing every finale on the way from Chicago to Plainfield and a pile of his fireworks as well. Drinking lead to a late night and a good time. Though the good time didn’t continue onto the 5th where I needed to sober up while getting to my grandparents to stop in and say hey and my parents where there was a family get together for lunch. Ouch. Fun times just, ouch. Also on the family end of things has been a birthday party for my cousin Ross who turned 18 (now he can buy porn!)

Sadly on the car end of things my Bimmer decided to cost me an arm and a leg. Emissions testing was due so the week before I was planning on taking it in I had a fun surprise- The check engine light! Yes! One of my senors apparently had blown, of course taking it in ended up showing that 2 of them had blown. An arm and a leg later I had my car in great condition (aside from needing a wash, BADLY) and take my car in for testing where it promptly fails. Yes it fails. Why does it fail? For some reason the connector (which worked where I took my car in) that they plug the computer into wouldn’t scan it. Another trip to the shop (thankfully this one had no charge) and I was able to take my car in to pass. BMW one of the Micro$ofts of automobiles. See what I did there?

A lot has also been going on with work but none of you really care about that. Let’s just say at the time of writing this I’m about a month overdue for my yearly review so huge paycheck with backpay should be incoming soon. Score. Hung out with Rose a few times as the Tiny is in town on her vacation which involved gaming and movies. The usual. Saw Transformers 2 with Leah (see below) and had dinner with her. Dinner involved her usual brand of motivating me to do something with my life though this time she made some progress. Not sure if it was the area she had meant to but things are going to be changing soon for BuyZombie and my horror projects in general. Big changes. It’s always hit or miss when I hang out with Leah but once upon a time she was my muse on many things and still has the ability to kick that in on occasion.

Movies

My opinions of this movie leave me in agreement with most of my friends though at odds with the vast majority of reviews online. When I went to see Transformers 2 with Leah not only did we both enjoy it but felt it was better than the first. While Shia LaBeouf again had far too much screen time (honestly I don’t care how his college life in the movie is going) the Transformers actually got lines in this one. Enough lines to get ‘some’ character development out of the Transformers that previously did not exist. (While magic on the eyes the first movie did not exactly bring forth that much in plot while this one actually helped stabilize a bit of the Autobot and Decepticon heir achy, their goals, why they are truly at war, and a possible progression of where they could go with the series if it indeed continues. Did I mention that Ravage was awesome and I’m glad they decided to include the only real cat transformer!

First up that I’ve seen of late is Knowing. A Nicholas Cage movie of course means that it’s going to be something painful to watch where Nick Cage’s jacket and hair blow in the wind while he’s running and at some point he is holding a flashlight. All of these apply aside from it being painful to watch. Yes while it will be sadly overlooked by all as everyone seems to avoid Cage movies as of late this one is a fun filled movie combination of drama meets science fiction (in a completely unexpected twist… possibly because I didn’t watch the previews but once it kicks in I had no idea what to expect.) The super basic premise is that Cage stumbles across a sheet of paper that was buried in a time capsule that ACCURATELY predicts major disasters that are going to happen, including one that will be the most massive disaster to hit humanity ever. Honestly the movie was a fun little romp with great special effects (All I have to say is the airplane and train scenes, mainly the train scene- WOW! I actually was impressed.) If your in the mood for Cage in something that’s not been as ‘meh’ as most of his movies as of late this one is worth picking up. Just remember be prepared for a sci-fi twist part way through it.

Next up we’ll switch it up to my favorite genre, yes a little bit of Horror. Lucio Fulci’s Zombie is a CLASSIC zombie movie from the Italian Zombie Golden Age- this of course includes everything that Fulci happened to produce. Honestly I haven’t had a chance to watch the first of his classics in a few years and what can I saw the one scene that stands out above all others hasn’t changed from one of my favorite scenes in zombie movies of all time- Zombie Vs Shark. If you haven’t seen this scene before and are a horror fan you should feel nothing but ashamed of yoruself. While it is a typical zombie movie in the stance that we aren’t fully sure how it starts, our ‘hero’s’ are attempting to find out what happened to the father of one of them. They end up barely escaping with their lives and of course the infection has spread to be a global epidemic. (I’m really not ruining anything here this happens in just about every Zombie film.)

Continuing on with another piece of horror in what I’ve watched lately we will run with- The Last Horror Movie. To start with I highly suggest renting it from a video store for the end to properly work right. It starts off looking as if it will be one of the worst horror movies to have ever been shown- stick with it. While I can’t see this is one of the best horror movies that has ever been created and there is far too much on the snuff / torture end of things (I like suspense these days more than the gore.) The saving grace of this movie is how he questions why (based on the assumption that the movie is real) do you the viewer keep watching it. What draws you in to this piece of film that keeps showing people killed and expanding on this line of thinking to the finale. It was surprisingly entertaining but mainly from the way they would make you question watching it, without this it would have been just another generic serial killer flick.

Adventureland is one of the latest entries into the just out of high school going into college comedy genre. Where a man falls in love with a woman he can’t have and somehow ends up with her anyway. I do have to admit I did enjoy seeing Kristen Stewart in a roll that wasn’t Twilight which actually pictured her almost favorably as an actress, granted I can’t truely respect anyone who was in any of those movies at this point. Ok yes I STILL haven’t seen the twilight movies and don’t plan to it’s just the principal that I stand behind. Do remember what I felt would make a good ending for Twilight. Aside from that it wasn’t bad though I can only force myself to approve so many of these movies a year and say I fully enjoyed them and I believe that quota was already filled.

The Hurt Locker won best film at The Venice film Festival and upon watching it you can easily see why. Not a typical “war” movie it delves into the lives of those who disarm bombs for the military and a group of them that work in Iraq on disarming these explosives and how they live, their real life issues, and how they try to make a difference. Honestly- Well worth the watch. I do find it entertaining that the largest start in the movie, Guy Pearce, dies very early on and isn’t thought of as one of the main characters. If you like watching movies that focus on interactions between the characters and focus primarily on that, with a lot of action, set against a war zone in progress you should pick this one up immediately.

Lake Dead was one of the many movies shown in the After Dark Horrorfest series. This one was from the 2007 collection and I have to say while not great was surprisingly entertaining. Well entertaining in a southern hick, cannibal, inbred kind of way. It’s on occasion hard to watch these movies. Between having to work with some people from the south that I can see being part of these movies to the bad dialogue given to these kind of characters I’m pretty sure it’s obvious on why that would be. Lake Dead takes place as three sisters are given a motel from their grandfather that they never knew was alive. Their alcoholic father attempts to sway them from taking up this property but as he has only treated them badly their entire life they of course feel that this is most likely more of the same and proceed to claim their new property but instead find a group of serial killer cannibals who have a love for their family that will not keep them in the best of health.

I’m going to be brutally honest when it comes to Dead Girl- it is one of the most disturbingly fucked up movies that I have seen in a long time. That being said I can’t decide quite a few things on it. I can’t decide if I enjoyed it. I can’t decide if the acting was good. Finally I can’t at all decide if it was a zombie movie. The main premise is that 2 friends, Rickie and JT, while looking for a place to drink in an old mental asylum find a girl that’s dead or apparently so. The thing is she’s still alive. One of the two feel they need to alert the authorities and the other decides in a very twisted necrophiliac fashion to have his way with her. I can’t say much more past this without spoiling the film for anyone who might be interested in seeing this. The only thing that I will say is that you’ll need to be able to deal with a large amount of screwed up scenes for the payoff of the movie. I can’t promise that you will like the movie but I can promise that it will be one of the more original movies that you’ve seen in a long time.

Mulberry Street is another of the After Dark Horrorfest movies that have been released as part of their festival collection. While the zombie epidemic plagues or those that create a post apocalyptic environment of the majority of the population being dead are the most fun- sometimes mutant plagues can provide a good time as well. Manhattan’s rat problem has gotten out of hand when the rats have suddenly both grown in number and have started hunting humans to bite… and infect. The infection has mild symptoms at first of hair growth, nausea, headaches, sickness. This changes though when all who have become infected start to mutate into giant rat-human hybrids who not only eat people but also will spread the infection to those that they don’t kill. The movie follows a father whose daughter has just returned from the war and he is preparing to greet her return with a party. As they are connected they have to fight to survive the ever growing infected populace that is spreading across the island.

On the side I also ended up re-watching Friday the 13th 1-5 which I don’t think that I need to explain the premise of to anyone out there who would watch similar movies as I am. I honestly have no idea how I was able to sit through all of that. (With the original view of seeing the entire series straight! Wow was I fooling myself!) While classic slasher flicks flicks they haven’t aged well and with all sharing the same premise they are hard to continue watching them one after another.. after another.. after.. *twitches* Aside from that Rose had never seen The Incredible Hulk so I made sure to fit that in while she was over. While a greatly underwealming movie to many I found to to be one of the more enjoyable comic movies as of late. Maybe I’m just an Edward Norton fan, maybe I’m suckered in by Marvel having their own studio, all I know is that I liked it. I also slipped in another viewing of American Gangster as Molly had never seen it. Finally I also ended up watching The Mist again. Partial boredom, partial enjoying BJ-C’s writeup of the religious nut in the movie, and partially while staying awake late one night and have to say- I still love the movie.

TV

While I haven’t been keeping up with television as obcessively as I have been I did slightly (not fully) catch up on True Blood. It keeps getting interesting and I love the fact that there is some screen time with some enjoyable vampires (sadly Let The Right One In will not have a sequel. Actually that’s probably for the best.) Damn you Twilight for ruining what once was a good (too acceptable) genre and making it the laughingstock of horror. The other series I started up (only a couple of episodes) was Nurse Jackie which has a very similar feel to House M.D. and I think will be one that I keep up on. I finished rewatching the end of Battlestar Galactica twice now as both Molly and Neil hadn’t finished the series and finally watched the first episode of Californication and think it’ll be ANOTHER damn series to get me hooked. *sighs*

Books

Breathers, A Zombies Lament by S.G. Browne is one of the more entertaining zombie books that have come out in quite awhile. While I have already read the book I had never written on it and having recently won an autographed copy I felt that I should re-read the novel and rectify the lack of any writeup. In a world where zombies are both real and intelligent anything can happen. Not the mindless flesh craving creatures that I love to read about usually these zombies are subclass humans with no social standing and aren’t even flesh eaters, just undead! At least that’s how things are at the start of the novel as Andy, the main character we focus upon, writes (he’s mute) his way into our hearts and finds himself on a journey to both find love, himself, and a standing in society that the undead lack.

I haven’t had a lot of time to really read as of late but apparently the books I have been reading are on my ‘recently won’ list as I also recently won the copy of Midnight Walk that I read. Another autographed copy this one including 13 of the 14 authors of the short stories contained within. While the highlight of the book was clearly “The Measure of a Man” (you can’t blame me being biased on the author sending it to me though you can blame me for being biased towards anything with zombies!) It was the tale of a young man’s coming of age tale in a Zulu tribe in Africa, who are attacked by a slaver ship that appears to have been infected by the undead! My second favorite was actually the last of the tales within, “The Svancara Supper Society” which focused on the future of our planet as starvation kicks in and we look for alternate sources of food. One society has figured out a way to make their own food, and has a unique take on how to enjoy it.

Games

Dead Space has made me want a new science fiction space horror movie to be made. Combining a new interface that has almost 0 menu’s that interfere with the visualization on the screen (and isn’t an extension of your suit) with a plot that instantly hooks horror fans in there was nothing to complain about on this title. You can’t help but be hooked on a horror film that you can play which takes place in space. You play part of a rescue team that has gone to help a facility recover from apparently losing communication. The same facility the main characters girlfriend or wife does research on. You quickly discover that the ship hasn’t lost communication from any malfunction but due to being overrun by a horde of alien creatures who kill anything on site. Your ship is damaged and you now have to attempt to fix the ship in order to be able to return to your planet. Repair the ship AND eliminate the alien menace. There is an animated movie based on this game and it one of the next on my list to see.

Lego Batman, like Lego Star Wars before it, is just a blast to play through. Between following plot lines that are familiar to see, using cute characters, and having to build Lego ‘things’ to complete levels. I haven’t had a chance to beat it yet as I only recently picked it up but I’m nearly half done. How do I know how far done? Well that wold have to do with the fact that there are 3 acts to play through as Batman. Only 3? Well there are ALSO 3 acts to play through as the villains in the game! Each of these acts contain a variety of sub-missions both character and vehicle based. Simple and complex at the same time the Lego gaming universe continues to just be a fun casual series.

…and of course there has been plenty of playing Call of Duty 4. Having broke 100,000 kills I feel that I’ve finally beaten the game. Sadly Modern Warfare 2 isn’t due out until 11/10/09. It needs to come sooner!

“The only way to get rid of a temptation is to yield to it” Oscar Wilde really did have quite a few great quotes. I need to find a shirt with this one on it. Honestly I haven’t given in to any great temptations as of late but the quote. Just love it.

At any rate, my friend Shannon messaged me on aim the other day and mid conversation said: I like books…
My mind went straight to Sir. Mix-A-lot. So my response? Started with the first line and continued on.

I like big books and i cannot lie
You other brothers can’t deny
That when a book walks in with an itty bitty spine
And thick pages in your face
You get reading
Wanna get right through it
Cuz you notice that book was stuffed
Deep in the cover it’s wearing
I’m hooked and I can’t stop staring
Oh, novel I wanna get with ya
And hope your not full of pictures
My homeboys tried to warn me
But that book you got
Make Me so scholarly

I’m pretty sure I’ve lost my mind.

Movies

Blood Car is quite possibly one of the worst (and best!) horror movies that I have ever seen. It’s set in the near future, skyrocketing gas prices have gone to over $30 a gallon and almost no one but the rich drive anymore. (How there are multiple gas stations open in this small down is beyond me.) The main character is a Kindergarten teacher and scientist and is attempting to make an engine that will run on a natural resource (grass) he can’t get it to work but does find a natural resource to run it on- Blood. Honestly this is one of the worst movies I’ve seen in awhile but it’s so full of cheese I have to recommend it to everyone who likes horror movies. Lots of horror, blood, sex, and bad jokes. In the best ways possible.

Perkins 14 was one of the movies on the After Dark horror fest that is now a yearly event. While not every movie that comes from the fest is a winner, this one in my book was worth the watch. You had the psychological aspect of what’s going on in the beginning of the movie. The fun surprise of who ends up being the killer. The darker shots used in most of the chase scenes. It’s by no means one of the best horror movies out there but it is a very well put together horror movie. I was surprised with how well it was done as I had heard mixed reviews. The plot left me wondering on the entire back story of what really happened to lead up to this movie. They left a lot of questions up in the air (easy way to get an in for a prequel. )

I needed some non-thinking time so decided that I was going to re-watch Alien and Aliens. Giant bug type aliens, space marines, Sigourney Weaver in one of the most badass female roles of all time. I will always be grateful for Ridley Scott being able to direct such a masterpiece in science fiction horror. It’s movies like this series and Event Horizon that want me to see more horror set in outer space. (I do mean actual horror, not Jason, a leprechaun, or Pinhead. Don’t get me wrong Jason and Pinhead can apply, just not in space.)

I watched a few other movies as well: The Interview, Paul Blart Mall Cop, Role Models, What Just Happened, and re-Watched North by Northwest. None of them were bad (well aside from Paul Blart…) but none of them really stood out. The Interview had an artsy twist and showed an interesting if unbelievable relationship between 2 people. Role Models is hit or miss, if you like Seann William Scott you will like the movie. If you don’t, you won’t- just like all of his movies. What Just Happened was a movie where Robert De Niro plays the role of a producer whose career is failing and he tries to get both it and his life back on track. It’s De Niro so it’s worth seeing it for his performance and for Bruce Willis with a Grizzly Adams beard. Also If you haven’t seen North by Northwest though it still stands up after all this time. I just assume most of the people who read this blog would have seen it by now and don’t need me to hype it.

TV

I had a chance to finish watching the second season of Breaking Bad. For those of you who don’t know what the show is about it started off with a Chemistry teacher (played by the dad from Malcolm in the Middle in a very serious role) who finds out he has cancer. This is the final way to top off his son being disabled and his wife being pregnant. Cancer with limited time to live and he wants to find a way to provide for his family when he’s gone. He’s pretty much hit the depression stage when his brother in law, a DEA agent, takes him on a ride along where he sees one of his ex students barely escape from being arrested for making crystal meth. This gives him the idea to go into business with his student to make enough money to support his family. Over the top? Possibly. It also has some of the best acting I’ve seen on TV and can’t stress enough to pickup the first season (and second once it comes out on DVD this fall!)

Other TV? Well I had a chance to start watching Sons of Anarchy as it was on the DVR yet won’t be able to finish it until the DVD’s of the first season come out next month. So far it really is like The Sopranos meets a motorcycle gang. AMAZING production value and another great set of actors. Also this season of Weeds has started and I’m 2 episodes in. It hasn’t lost any of it’s greatness and I’m looking forward to the rest!

Books

While I haven’t had much time to read recently I did re-read A Kiss of Shadows by Laurell K. Hamilton (of Anita Blake fame.) While I have a pile of unread books to dig through I first read this book when it was new (2002) and wanting to actually read the entire series needed a refresher. A half human princess of the “Fey” (they seem a lot like elves but are a race of faeries) has been in hiding for years. They are a race that lives on our planet but not usually among humanity. With being the only mortal Fey of royal blood her life was constantly being threatened so she choose to attempt to live a normal human life. While investigating a case she is drawn back into her previous life and offered everything back, with a price, and all of the previous threats resurface.

I WILL have some project news in the near future. 2 of my auto running projects are nearly completion I just need to make some tweaks and get art up for them. More zombies? Check. More horror? Check. On a side note.. some famous people died over the past couple weeks. I’m pretty sure you’ve heard about that already though. At length.

So The Shield is over. Michael Chiklis will no longer grace the television screen as Detective Vic Mackey and honestly it’s been a hell of a ride. It’s rare that any television show will come to a close tying everything together and making sure every character (not dead or in jail) that was important is somehow addressed throughout the entire show and into the finale.

I can’t go into too much detail without giving away the true ending though I will say this: Ronnie, while deserving of what happened, I feel was screwed in the end results. Shane’s choice was shocking and did not seem fitting for his actions towards others to truly match his character though helped to tie in the most important closure. Vic got exactly what he had coming to him. In the most twisted and devious way the writers could ruin Vic and have karma kick in they did it. I honestly did not see how they played it out coming. Well played. Well played indeed.

Amazon:
Season 1
Season 2
Season 3
Season 4
Season 5
Season 6

I’m not sure why I’ve reggae on the mind as of late. I’ve been primarily listening to Stereophonics, The Black Crowes, and the new Buckcherry album as of late. I guess it just fits the mood.

Well, another couple weeks without updates and another couple weeks of a LOT going on. Honestly being the beginning of winter I would think that I would be staying in more often but apparently that is not fully the case.

To start with were a couple birthdays. First was Rob’s birthday which started out great, had a lot of people over: Rob(of course), his sister, Neil(again duh), Rex, Matt R., Danno, Brad, Adam, Mia.. and I’m pretty sure I’m forgetting someone. Pregaming was a good time and right as we were heading out the door I got a call that my dad was in the hospital. Yay. Obviously he ended up ok or this would have been a much less uplifting beginning to a post but I did end up skipping out on Rob’s party to talk to my mother for a ‘bit.’ I apparently missed a couple entertaining things as Rob cracked his head open and Matt and Brad got into it.

As I said there were a couple birthday’s so the second up was Rose’s birthday. Her ideal plan for birthday and another night over? A movie, the last episode of Season 1 of True Blood, and of course what took up the vast majority of our time:



Gears of War 2 being completely beaten in coop mode! Sure it was only regular difficulty but as you can see 1-2 achievements came from playing through the game’s story mode and 1 from going through 10 levels of Horde. I can’t even imagine how hard the next Horde achievement is, 50 rounds? GAH! (Rose also got an achievement I missed from CoD 4 while over and I was doing stuff online.) Next run through will probably be Call of Duty 5 or Gears 2 on hard.

Now for the unexpected part of the week. As we’ve been talking again, Leah and I decided to get together for dinner and drinks at the Dubliner at the Promenade. That quickly turned into a very entertaining four hours of catching up in our usual way which was heavy on content in a ‘slightly’ flirtatious style *grin*. Life just keeps getting more and more interesting. Had both a fun and relaxing night night; I honestly hope this works out better than the last time we were starting to hang out again. I’m a glutton for punishment I know.

Free time past that? Well I’ve been playing a LOT of Call of Duty 5 online, working on my web projects, and reading as of late.

Now for my big personal geek news I decided my laptop was getting old, slow, and beaten up so I talked myself into buying a new one.. or two. Wait.. two?

Now keep in mind while I have them next to each other they look the same size, however the first of the two is a 15″ while the second is a 9″ (see the pencil in the picture for a size idea of the second one.) Basically the second one ended up free with how the pricing worked out. So. Specs for those interested:
It’s a Dell Studio 15: Hi Resolution, glossy widescreen 15.4 inch display (1920×1200)
Intel Core 2 Duo P8400, 2.2GHz, 1066Mhz, 3M L2 Cache
4GB, DDR2, 800MHz 2 Dimm
256MB ATI Mobility Radeon HD 3450
250G 7200RPM SATA Hard Drive Free Fall Sensor
Integrated Finger Print Reader
Back-lit Keyboard

On the Dell Mini 9: 8.9 inch Wide Screen WSVGA TLLCD
Inspiron 910 Intel Atom processor N270, 1.6GHz, 533Mhz512K L2 Cache
1GB,DDR2,533MHZ,1 DIMM
16GB Solid State Drive (mini-card Module/PATA)

Yes I actually do have a use for the Mini 9 as well. Amazingly enough!

Futurama: The Beast with a Billion Backs
I know trying to sell people on animated movies can be like pulling teeth. Futurama has always held a special place in my heart though. It’s a mixture of humor and science fiction that’s actually backed up (to an extent) by fact. The written unreadable language in the series is actually code, the scientific facts they spout or all actually valid, it’s insane. Sure the space ships, robots, etc are all far in the future but that’s where the show takes place so it works.

If you’ve watched the show at all you know that there is an intro at the beginning of every episode where they crash their ship into a screen showing a b&w cartoon. This happens as usual but this time we get a mini b&w Futurama cartoon that actually lasts about 5 minutes. (Done in the classic style of how people moved and acted in those ancient ancient cartoon times!) It was entertaining in that something different kind of feel though if they ever did a full episode in the style I don’t think I would keep interested.

Onto the second movie of Futurama itself though: it rocked. The original voice cast is back again and it starts off as if you were an episode in to a 4 episode mini-series. Fry is dating a girl and the entire plot evolves from the fact that he’s in love and she wants an open relationship. How can this tie into “The beast with a billion backs” you ask? Well when Fry is brokenhearted and a giant alien comes to offer him and the rest of humanity love.. he of course sells us out. The humor is once again top notch and when you throw in a subplot of Bender joining a League of Robots (that doesn’t exist) whose purpose is to kill all humans.

If you loved the series, you’ll love this. If you haven’t seen the first movie, it’s ok you’ll still love this. If you haven’t seen the series… start at the beginning and do it today!

Amazon

Dexter Season 2
Season 2 starts up shortly after Season 1′s ending and hits the ground running. As stated before and if you know anything about the series Dexter is both a blood analyst for the police and a serial killer who only goes after murderers who escaped the law through the court system. The end of the first episode though brings forth what will be the entire point of this season: Dexter’s stash of bodies that he puts in the ocean is found by a diving team. All hell breaks loose in Dexter’s little world.

With so much focus on this ‘new’ serial killer and evidence keeps popping up to implicate someone it is only a matter of time before it is narrowed down to the department. Once a policeman is suspected things get interesting and… I’ll have to leave it at that portion of the plot without giving away any real spoilers. There is also a new girl that falls inter Dexter’s life. Dexter has to tell his girlfriend Rita that he has an addiction to explain away some of his actions and this addiction has her force him into AA. (He obviously can’t explain he’s addicted to killing though..) In AA his sponsor ends up being a British woman named Lila. Wow. As much as I’m attracted to Italians I think I’m also equally attracted to psychopaths (of course some would argue that they are one in the same…*grins*) Lila is the perfect mix of brunette, sex, addiction, and destructive behavior that just makes her a fun character to have on the show and ties in greatly to how events unfold in Dexter’s life (with a great accent to top it off!)

Season 2 takes the greatness built up by Season 1, shoots it up a level in violence and sex, adds a deep plot filled to the brim with huge problems that must be overcome and than makes you ask for more. It’s worth buying both seasons as they are worth not just one view but multiple viewings. You just have to love serial killers… erm.. waitasec. That didn’t come out right…

Amazon

So in the past week what have I been doing *pulls at goatee*

Went out with Sal, his wife, Matt, and Casey for one of the rounds of Neil’s birthday over at Maxims on Wednesday. Pretty uneventful just a lot of drinking. Followed by replacing Matt with Rob and Brad for a huge night of drinking Saturday night for Neil again over at Morgans followed by Dark Bar in the city. (Of course being in Greek town at 5am we ended up getting gyro’s before the night was over.) At Morgan’s there was a random girl that was definitely having way too much to drink. Which was rather boring until she ended up getting into a fight with her boyfriend’s sister, turn around to walk away and run face first into a tree, face plant on Halsted, attempt to get up and fall right back down. I don’t know why it is so entertaining to watch the suffering of other sometimes.

Monday I hung out with Rose before she was due to leave back for school this week. Went to go see Death Race and had our usual Max and Erma’s movie going dinner. This last trip in town by her was probably the least of her I’ve seen since I’ve known her, I have a feeling that explains why there’s been so few new movies watched as of late They really need to finish the AMC they are putting up semi-close to my place (or I suppose I could always just go to any of the other 100,000 movie theaters in Chicago..)

On web related things:
Installed the base CMS (content management system) for a couple of my projects. Two E-Zines I plan on launching as well as a secondary Zombie project that I have in the works.. and speaking of Zombies…

I of course made my weekly updates on: BuyZombie. Actually it’s a bit neat. I’ve had both an author and an editor contact me about promoting their books now in the past 2 weeks. It’s really tempting me to add more along the lines of articles instead of just what Zombie stuff is for sale out there.

Also I removed Kontera advertising from this blog. I was adding it to a few sites late at night and didn’t realize that I had added it to my personal blog. Gah! So no more blue underlined links on the page. Sorry ’bout that.

In a vegetative state I also ended up playing a ton of Call of Duty 4 (shocking I know!), watched some TV, movies, and reading obviously. So yes more reviews soon.