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DVD Review: 30,000 Leagues Under the Sea (2007)

The Story

Lt. Aronnaux (Lorenzo Lamas) and the crew of the Aquanaut submarine are charged with recovering a missing vessel, downed by a mysterious robotic squid. What they find is Captain Nemo (Sean Lawlor), an undersea scoundrel eager to wreak havoc on the surface. This high-tech update of the Jules Verne adventure classic also stars Natalie Stone as Lt. Cmdr. Rollins and Kim Little as specialist Sustin.

The Deal

Asylum Pictures does it again. Great CGI for a non- mainstream movie. It ranks up there with Battlestar Galactica in ship designs. The story is taken straight for the Jules Verne book. Nemo finds Atlantis in this adaptation and needs help creating an oxygen dome over it, while at the same time, nuking the planet. Lorenzo Lamas does his regular job of acting the hero part, while Asylum regulars play out the rest of the cast.

The DVD itself has no bonus features other than trailers and scene selections.


The Bottom Line

When I first started the DVD, I was impressed. The ships looked great. CGI was top notch. The script however was terrible. I have to give this movie a BURN. It could have been at “rent” status with a little work though.

They should have given the project to a fan fiction writer. It seems like the script was phoned in. Everything else was done very well. I appreciate the work that Lamas does, but they should have given the part to Edward Furlong. Those who are used to them should only use such a bad script.


Best Quote

“So what is the deal between you and the Lt. Commander?”
“She’s my ex-wife.” – Lorenzo Lamas as Lt. Aronnaux.

One for the real Browncoats

Official Malcolm Reynolds Stunt Pistol
By QuantumMechanix.com
MSRP: $149.95

JOSS WHEDON'S SHORT-LIVED but much-loved TV series Firefly aired on the Fox channel in 2002 and was quickly canceled, for reasons that still mystify the show's fans. Undaunted, however, Whedon, famed creator of the incredibly popular Buffy the Vampire Slayer series, put his efforts into writing and producing a film that tied up the loose ends left by the orphaned series. This highly rated film was called Serenity, after the ship around which the series was centered.

As a solid replica model it is unsurpassed.


Malcolm Reynolds is the captain of this battered freighter/passenger ship. While Gene Roddenberry used the metaphor "Wagon Train to the stars" to sell Star Trek, Joss Whedon here uses the term far more literally. Firefly and Serenity are quite literally set in an outer-space version of the wild, wild west. And fans adored it.

Soon fan conventions were firing up and a new group of aficionados known as Browncoats began dressing up as their favorite heroes and heroines from the show, armed with replicas of the clothing and weapons. Up until now, people had to make do with hand-made items.

Now, thanks to Quantum Mechanix, fans can have an absolutely accurate replica of the pistol carried by Mal Reynolds, a replica molded from the original prop used by Nathan Fillion (the actor who played Mal in both the series and the film) itself.

The pistol has no moving parts but is made up of several separately cast resin pieces, each infused with metallic bronze and steel powder for a realistic metal effect. While the original prop was cast from one solid piece of resin, Quantum Mechanix has broken the pistol down into parts that are assembled into this fine prop replica.

The replica pistol comes in a simple black box, with no fancy packaging but with three sheets of paper—a Moses Brothers Firearms Certificate of Authenticity, a license to carry and, for the first 1,500 pistols sold, a 14x17-inch poster of Barlow's Guide to Small Arms, featuring a detailed diagram of the pistol and its functions.

Get a grip on your imagination

Officially known as a Moses Brothers Self-Defense Engine Frontier Model B, this pistol is highly reminiscent of weapons carried by frontier Army soldiers in the mid- to late 1800s. With its long, sleek barrel and six-shooter pistol grip, this one has been updated to portray something from a fantasy future, almost a steampunk retro-future redesign, and I applaud the designers for melding the old and the new into something so quickly recognized for what it is supposed to be.

Separating the solid model into several parts allows for a better division between pieces. You won't see any painted lines separating the silver from the bronze; they are separate pieces, so it just looks right. The handgrips are screwed in with Allen screws. The barrel cleaners are actually attached to metal rods cast into the pistol's body.

The metallic look comes from the infusion of metallic powder, but the gun is spray-painted to add weathering and aging. The pistol feels good in the hand, though a little light. Since this model is not molded from metal, it doesn't feel like a real weapon—it just doesn't have the heft.

And of course, being cast from solid pieces of resin, it has no moving parts, which is the only true pity here. But as a solid replica model it is unsurpassed.

The trigger is molded to the trigger guard (likely to ensure it won't break the resin trigger if force is applied). The hammer and safety, as well as the mode switch, are here, but of course nonmoving. The barrel is tarnished with a black, sootlike paint that adds to the impression that this is a long-used weapon. The handgrips are molded with a wood-grain finish.

Included in the simple packaging (the pistol comes in a bubble-wrapped envelope inside a simple black box with a nicely printed glossy label) is a license to carry a concealed weapon from the planet Shadow, issued in the year 2461. The permit has a space for the bearer's name. This is a rolled-up glossy card measuring 6x8 inches. The glossy certificate of authenticity measures 8x11 inches and details the quality assurance checks the weapon went through.

So while the finish may be somewhat dull, this replica is nonetheless very shiny. -(Scifi.com)

Italian Spiderman

Cootie PSA

Not so big in Texas...

Fact of the Day

A recent study by Pfizer Incorporated notes that Texas average penis length is seven percent lower than in its neighboring states.
-Pfizer.com

Striking sense of humor

Here is some fun on the picket line with the writers of the Daily Show.

They actually do a great job of explaining the strike to anyone who does not already know..

Gov. Mike Huckabee for President

If I was going to run for ANY political office, I would try this campaign.

A message from James Gunn about the strike.

-Warning- Language-

From James Gunn's personal Blog:


I'm on strike!

As a member of the Writers Guild of America, I have been on strike since 12 am last night.

The only reason for the strike – and don't believe anything to the contrary – is that the studios have refused to pay writers (and screen actors, and directors) residuals on new media. When you download a movie from Amazon or a TV show on iTunes, the people who created that content, who devised it, wrote it, acted in it, and directed it, get exactly 0% of the profits. And the studios want it to stay that way.

The WGA was asking for an increase in the residuals made on DVD sales (unlike new media, creators make a small percentage off of DVD and VHS sales, pay-per-view showings, TV sales, etc). For months now the studios have said that this was the reason the contract couldn't be closed. However, at the 11th hour – last night – the WGA took that off the table. It came down to new media and only new media. And the studios refused to budge.

This strike is absolutely not a matter of the rich getting richer. We're not striking because of guys like me who have made numerous feature films, or guys like Greg Daniels who have created popular TV shows. This is for middle-class writers – your regular TV staff writers and people who may have done one or two small feature films. Residuals are a way they can make perhaps a few thousand dollars a year between gigs. This is a way they can put food on the table and pay the rent during downtime – and downtime is something almost all writers (and actors and directors) have.

And the writers guild are striking not only for themselves – they're striking for the actors and directors as well. Most likely, whatever deal we agree to is the same deal the actors and directors will get when their contracts are up later this year.

None of the TV shows or movies you watch would exist without us, the people who created them, who poured our hearts and souls into the making of them. And yet, again, the studios think that only they should be making the money off of them. And new media is exceptionally important – in just a few years that may be the way most of us experience most of our entertainment.

I've gotten a lot of messages from MySpace folks worried about me or my various projects. The truth is, as long as the strike ends in the next thirty to forty years, I should be personally fine. And, to be quite honest, I'm excited about the break. I'm working on some smaller, non-studio, non-guild related projects with my brothers Brian and Sean, and with the LOLLILOVE crew of Pete Alton and Stevie Blackehart. This is stuff that really fires me up.

As for my big projects, PETS is definitely on hold, as I'm in the middle of writing the script, and can't turn anything in until the strike is over. THE BELCOO EXPERIMENT is a different story – the script is completely finished, my deal with the producers is done, and I could direct it if we all chose to do that. But would I want to commit to a movie that I wouldn't have the freedom to rewrite even if I wanted to?

However, although the strike for me is, in some ways, a good thing, I recognize how shitty it is for the rest of the industry, and the city of Los Angeles in general, so I want it to end quickly. I can't help but think of all the crew people who are going to lose jobs because of this, or the Burbank waiters and waitresses whose tips are going to dry up as the work around them does – not to mention the strippers across the LA area whose g-strings rely on writers and actors being flush with cash. Let's end this fucking strike for the strippers, okay?

Not to mention you guys, the audience. You're going to start to feel it right away with the late-night talk shows that are going to disappear or get real crappy real quick. And, if it lasts for a bit, you're going to lose out on the second half of the seasons of your favorite TV shows (already, WGA member Steve Carell didn't show up to set, so this season of THE OFFICE could be kaput after the next few already-shot episodes.) The studios will also rush movies into production with unfinished scripts which means, in a little less than a year from now, you're going to see the shittiest movies of all time.

So for their stinginess, their greed, and their overall bullshit, the studios can go fuck themselves. And not in a nice way either.


Be good,

James

PC Game Review: STALKER: Shadow of Chernobyl

STALKER: Shadow of Chernobyl

The Story

The world’s worst nuclear disaster occurred on April 26, 1986, at the Chernobyl power facility in the Ukraine. The area slowly recovered until 2006 when an unforeseen second explosion rocked the landscape, leaving a vast "Exclusion Zone" plagued with deadly energy disturbances in its wake. The quarantined Exclusion Zone expanded over time, and by 2012, specially equipped poachers, known as S.T.A.L.K.E.R.s, venture into the Zone to claim radioactive artifacts for the black market. You are a new S.T.A.L.K.E.R. battling for survival among rivals, soldiers and mutant creatures while trying to discover the true nature of Chernobyl’s dark past and horrific future.


The Deal

STALKER is a PC game that takes place in 2012 in Russia. It is a very different Russia where Chernobyl was not contained and is now part of a militant war zone. The character that you play is a loner, like everyone else, who is just trying to make it day to day. You basically go on missions of different sorts to earn stuff, that you can use or trade. Your overall goal is to get better gear, so you can travel closer to the main facility. The main facility is visited by a rare few because the fallout is very heavy. This has also caused the nearby lifeforms to become heavily mutated. These mutants would love nothing more than to eat your character.



The Bottom Line

First off, I worked in the PC software field for a few years. Here is some advice: Never buy a PC game at release. Always wait until it is about $20. By then, there are enough patches and mods out there to make it worthwhile.

Now the low down – This is a great game! If you love first person shooters, then it is a definite BUY for you. I typically stick to the mainstream FPS (Halo, Battlefront, etc) but I have enjoyed the heck out of this. What can I say, you go around on a massive map (20 miles of terrain) and shoot, loot, and explore. The AI is pretty good too. Nobody sticks around and lets you shoot him or her, they will duck and hide and even flank you sometimes. And there are a ton of mods to download for free. I even found one that turned it into a “horror” game by auto adjusting the lighting and gore. Lots of fun!



Best Quote
“Find him dead or alive, I don’t give a sh!t, just bring back the thumbdrive.”

Book Review: The Complete Idiot's Guide - The Ultimate Reading Lists

The Story

Great reads for busy people.
This is a guide to help busy people find great reads in fiction and non-fiction. Filled with recommendations of popular, entertaining reading, this book covers mystery and suspense, romance, women’s fiction and chick lit, westerns, science fiction, such nonfiction topics as animals, art, biography, memoirs, business, true crime, and more. Plus, each entry includes a summary of the book, its significance, and a critique/observation/comment. – amazon.com



The Deal

Consider this the “Top Ten Books About_________(fill in the blank). Really. The authors have chosen their lists of books that represent the best of a number of categories, including fiction and nonfiction and every sub category in between imaginable. Just like any awards show or ranking of best of all time series, you will find yourself going, “I cannot believe that is on there (or NOT on there).”
However, in these 320 pages you will also find many ideas for that next great read.

The Bottom Line

My wife is a fanatical reader. She took this book from me and got a lot of ideas on books to check out from this selection. Really she should be the one writing this, but, as is life. It is a solid MUST HAVE for anyone that owns more books than DVDs and is always thinking about what to read next. It should be available at every library at the entrance.


The Quote
“Best Fiction in Horror (that involves cats).”

Death Is My Co-Pilot

HARRY POTTER IN THE HOOD

Kitty Fight

Is this what I think it is?

The Back - up

Friday Fun Flick-

Once again, it's funny because it's real.

Cootie Legos

300 :cats

Book Review: "Aliens: Omnibus" Volume 1 - Dark Horse Comics

Aliens: Omnibus Volume 1

The Story:

Dark Horse Comics took the industry by storm with its release of Aliens, a comics series that for the first time captured the power of film source material and expanded its universe in a way that fans applauded worldwide. Now, the first three Dark Horse Aliens series - Outbreak, Nightmare Asylum and Female War - are collected in a value-priced, quality-format omnibus, featuring nearly 400 story pages in full color. Written by screen and television scribe Mark Verheiden (The Mask, Battlestar Gallactica) and illustrated with consummate skill by Mark A. Nelson, Den Beauvais and Sam Kieth, Aliens Omnibus Volume 1 is an essential piece of the Aliens mythos and a great entry point into the storied Dark Horse Aliens library. – amazon.com

The Deal:

These 384 pages will grab hold of your attention like the true sequel to the second movie “Aliens” should have. This 3-story alternative to the “Aliens 3” movie, tells the continuing story of Ripley, Wilks, and Rebecca (Newt). Of course the aliens are back also, in many different ways and mankind must fight them on Earth, in space, and on the alien homeworld. We also see the return of the other aliens. The gigantic elephant-nosed ones from the first movie who piloted the spaceship that crashed and was full of eggs.

The Bottom Line:

You cannot go wrong buying this trade paperback. So it is a BUY. This is a must for any fan of the series or fan of dark comics. The artwork is stunning and the storyline is top notch. You would have to have a crate of comics to hold the entire story in this one book and it stores a lot easier.

The Quote:

“This time, you nuke the site from orbit. But let me guess, you aren’t going to listen to me, are you? You people never learn.” - Ripley

DVD Review of "Rise: Blood Hunter"

Rise: Blood Hunter

The Story:

Reporter Sadie Blake (Lucy Liu) awakens to find herself in a morgue, transformed into a member of the undead by a vampire cult. With the help of cop Clyde Rawlins (Michael Chiklis), who lost his daughter to the same sect, Sadie undertakes a mission of revenge against those who took away her life. Carla Gugino and James D'Arcy co-star in this supernatural thriller. Marilyn Manson appears, without makeup, as a bartender.

The Deal:

This movie really does an interesting spin on the vampire story. The vampires here drink blood, but have no fangs. They must use knives like everyone else. They can only be killed by driving an object through the heart – metal counts. Also, they cast no reflection. That’s is for pros. Sunlight is merely an inconvenience. Oh and finally, they have no powers. They get their butt kicked by every Tom, Dick, and Harry, just like everyone else. In Fact the heroine gets beat down constantly in the two hours run time.

Half the movie is told in flashback sequence, which at first was kind of annoying. Think “Memento: a vampire story”. However it did pay off in the end. In fact, if the director had not been creative with the editing, then the story would have been terrible.

The Bottom Line:

This is a decent RENT. The stars in this movie do a great job with the material. There is also enough T&A in here to make it worth your while. Lucy Liu naked, covered in blood- I know there is a fansite for this somewhere… The DVD however, lacks special features other than director’s commentary. There is a making of featurette, which is not very long and was sort of an after thought of camcorder footage around the set. If you are going to make a direct to DVD movie, why not pack it with DVD extras?!

The Quote:

“Go wash your hands. I am kind of picky about that sort of thing.” Lucy Liu to her female hooker date…

What's wrong Billy?

Sweet Sugar (1973) - When Cats Attack

Child in the Machine

Halo 3 almost here!

Being in advertising myself, I must say that this is one of the best commercials I have seen for a long time. It is not 'horror' but I think our average crowd will enjoy. I just had to share it here.

-DeepSeven

Perfume: The Story of a Murder

Review by: DeepSeven
(Dustin Hoffman and Alan Rickman 2006) No pun intended, but this movie really took my breath away. I know that this is not my normal sci fi horror, but we should all try something different once and a while.

SYNOPSIS: In 16th century France a baby is born with superhuman olfactory senses. He goes up to be a scary introvert with a superhuman nose. When I say his sniffer is super, I mean he can smell a rock from across a room. He can even smell a perfume and recreate it by smell, and even make it better. This is where the movie goes. He discovers the greatest scent in the world in he scent of young innocent girls. He proceeds to invent a way to harvest the essence of young beauty, however this can only be done by killing them…

He then goes on a serial killer spree of killing young maidens and reaping their scent. After he collects enough of the perfect scents he can combine them together to create the most powerful fragrance in the world. He finally chases down the last piece of his perfume puzzle and takes her scent; he then also mixes it up.

This is where the movie goes off the page. He is sent to the executioner for his crimes, which he does admit too. However before he is taken to the stage to have every joint in his body broken with a metal rod, he puts a dab of the new perfume on. This causes everyone to see him as an angel a weep at his feet. Furthermore, he puts a dab on his handkerchief and throws it into the crowd; this causes an explosive orgy that envelops even the priests and the cardinal bishop of the church.

Great movie, great to look at, and great for something a little different.

BEST LINE: “I said you should experiment, I did not say you should boil the cat!”

http://www.myeverything.com/index.aspx#HEARME/bc03ee21-7acf-125d-9ab1-12b972cafcdb/aea2c101-4fc7-4ae5-b95f-8fe92bd33eb3/bc24eafa-6a4d-4649-ad30-02f666046d53/

Chasing Ad Dollar Is All Fun and Games

Entertainment Industry
Leads Drive to Enhance
Interactive Campaigns
By STEPHANIE KANG
August 7, 2007; Page B3WSJ


In the coming film "The Seeker: The Dark is Rising," a teenage boy travels through time, collecting the six different signs that will help him save the world. To market the movie, family-friendly film studio Fox Walden is sending viewers on a hunt for the same signs, hidden in the movie's advertising and marketing.

Fox Walden hid images of the six signs -- colorful talisman-like symbols -- in everything from movie trailers to billboards to the cardboard cutouts displayed in movie theaters.

When users plug in the signs on the movie's Web site in a specific order, they get access to content such as behind-the-scenes footage and interviews with the movie's cast and crew.


Talisman-like signs from 'The Seeker' are hidden in the movie's marketing materials.
The hunt for symbols in real-life marketing materials "mirrors the story of the movie," says Jeffrey Godsick, president of marketing for Fox Walden. But instead of saving the world, Fox Walden wants to engage consumers, getting them interested in the film months before it hits theaters in October. Between late July and the movie's opening, the studio will insert 25 different combinations of the signs into its marketing, which lead to 25 different pieces of content on the Web site.

Movie studios once used to concentrate their marketing on TV ad campaigns, but as viewers increasingly use digital video recorders to avoid ads, studios -- as with other marketers -- are trying an array of additional marketing techniques.

In recent years, some studios have put resources into buzz marketing, efforts aimed at sparking interest about a movie among demographic groups seen as potential fans. Adding impetus to these moves is pressure on studios to land the biggest audience possible on a film's opening weekend, given movie theaters' tendency nowadays to drop a film if it doesn't fill theaters immediately.

Walden Media, a unit of Philip Anschutz's Anschutz Film Group, which jointly owns Fox Walden with News Corp.'s 20th Century Fox film studio, developed an elaborate grass-roots marketing campaign for one of its last projects, "The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe," released by Walt Disney. As part of that effort, Disney and Walden sent "Narnia" materials to schools, including copies of the C.S. Lewis novel on which the film is based, among other moves. (Dow Jones & Co., publisher of The Wall Street Journal, agreed last week to be purchased by News Corp.)

"The Seeker" is based on "The Dark is Rising," by award-winning children's author Susan Cooper. The novel's plot hinges on the same six symbols as in the movie, and Fox Walden hopes the signs in the ad campaign will appeal to the book's fan base, as well as fantasy-adventure fans generally.

To make consumers aware of the campaign, Mr. Godsick says Fox Walden is talking with Internet movie bloggers and television and print entertainment outlets. Fox Walden is also discussing stunts such as having trucks with billboards of specific signs roaming around a city such as New York for a day, or hanging up a different poster with a sign on six consecutive retail-store windows for a day. Mr. Godsick hopes fans will take pictures of these stunts, talk about them online and spread the word about the movie. The film's director, David L. Cunningham, hid images of the different signs in the movie itself. "It helps create the mood of the film, and it allowed the marketing guys to build on that" in the campaign, Mr. Cunningham says.

The experiential approach to marketing films is more commonplace than ever, says Damon Wolf, a partner at Crew Creative Advertising in Los Angeles, which isn't working on the "Seeker" campaign. "These campaigns build brand equity out of the gate and allow the viewer to be part of the marketing experience," he says. "If it's executed creatively, it has the potential to create a viral frenzy, which is exactly what you want."

Indeed, the recent success of Fox's "The Simpsons Movie" was likely helped by an extensive marketing campaign that included the conversion of almost a dozen 7-Eleven stores to imitate the fictional convenience store featured in the television show.

Consumers also were able to buy products based on those in the show and to convert pictures of themselves into "Simpsons" characters online.

The treasure-hunt element of the "Seeker" marketing campaign is an increasingly popular way of generating interest among diehard fans of a book, movie or other entertainment product.

To promote the third version of its sci-fi videogame "Halo," due in stores late next month, Microsoft is running a series of elaborate treasure hunts. It has arranged for clues to be planted in flyers handed out in different cities, in online comic books or in retail kiosks selling Microsoft Xbox game consoles. Fans who play along discover background stories about characters from the game.

"The goal is to give our existing fans -- a very hardcore, rabid group -- new, exciting information," says Aaron Elliott, online marketing manager at Xbox Global Marketing. "But we also wanted to bring new fans to the franchise without immersing them immediately into the arcane stuff."

While dedicated fans may enjoy the extra material, Mr. Elliott says it was nearly impossible to put out enough content to satisfy truly rabid fans. At the same time, the complicated, tech-heavy hunting could turn off more casual fans.

Mr. Godsick acknowledges the campaign isn't for everyone. "People who like to get engaged in these kinds of games are a more narrow audience, but it's the kind of people who are the most rabid fans. They really dig movies, and they tend to be there Friday night."

Ramblings

Well, Stargate SG-1 is all but over except for a couple of movies. Atlantis is going strong, that show has really come into its own. I must say that I am very proud to have been there since the beginning. But enough about the past.

I have really enjoyed this new fouth season of the "4400". It was always a really good show, but now I feel that it is blossoming (kinda like a season two "Lost"). Also the Summer season has brought us the new sleeper hit hit "Burn Notice". It is about spies and gadgets. Real "MacGuyver" meets "Equalizer". Thank goodness that is all I am really smitten with for the Summer season, this way I can get a little break to get ready for the new Fall line up!

In movies. Gotta say that I loved the "Transformers", it was really great. Made me feel like a kid all over a again. I can not wait until it comes out on video so I can share it with my own kid. (He is a little young for some parts...)

DeepSeven out-

Transmorphers

Review by DeepSeven

(Asylum Pictures starring Scott Leigh) Let me say up front that I did not watch every minute of this DVD movie. So you are not going to get my typical review. After the first 10 minutes the sound became about a second off. It looked like I was watching a dubbed movie. Thank goodness there was only 1 minute of action in the first 42 minutes of movie, or else the shots fired would have been off. This of course made the first 42 minutes seam like an episode or two of “Days of Our Lives”. I watched most of this in fast forward because I did not care to learn of the internal strife that was happening between the different characters, and who was in love with whom.

After the first half of the movie some actual action started. The humans that live underground because the machine made the sky dark (sound familiar?) launch an attack. The machines or “transmorphers” are robots that can transform into a robot with a gun on its head and then transform back into just a robot holding a gun… Even here, not all of the sound effect got scored. So you see a lot of soldiers and robots shooting silent guns and silent explosions.

There is not much more I can say about this DVD. It did have a lot of extras, including a blooper reel and commentary track. It also had trailers for the other Asylum films including “Supercroc” which is also reviewed on Skullring.org. My final thought is that this movie was rushed in editing. It could have been much better with what they had already. The CGI was very nicely done and the props were top notch. Even the acting was pretty good. They just churned it out to hit the shelves at the same time as “Transformers” hit the theaters and that was their mistake in my opinion. Skip it.

Ice Spiders review

Ice Spiders (2007) starring Patrick Muldoon and Vanessa Williams

Another "Most Dangerous Night" on Sci Fi Saturday with this interesting movie. I can take a lot, and I am the most tolerant movie viewer around; but this movie pushed me over the edge.

Synopsis:
Bunch of rich kids head to the mountains to practice for the Olympics at an off season resort. The resort is staffed by stereotypical wise cracking ski slackers. Just happens that next door is an abandon military base that the government is growing enlarged spiders to harvest spider web to make armor. The six spiders get loose and proceed to kill everyone, including armed guards. Our ski school hero runs one over with a snow mobile and kills another with a mounted deer head. (I guess the army should have tried that attack first.) To make a long story short, our hero gets the spiders to follow him on to the snowboard ramp where the another slacker blows them up with a avalanche cannon...


I can almost image the pitch for this movie to the studio. It had to be something like:
Writer - "First think of the movie Ski School then add in 5, no make that 6, giant spiders."
Producer - "You mean giant like the size of a house? with armor?"
Writer - "No, giant like the size of a dog."
Producer - "Are they invulnerable?"
Writer - "No, they can shoot webs like Spider man though."
Producer - "I love it."


Best Line: "We are doing this to save lives, spider silk is strong as iron. Our military needs it."

Shake Hands With Danger

Knowledge Nugget

The oldest continuously-played Dungeons & Dragons character is believed to be a 237th level magic-user named Kirin Blade. Tom Darcy started his character in 1979, and has played the game every weekend since then for an estimated total of 22,500 hours.

Very Funny

J.K. Rowling Hints At Harry Potter Date Rape

Manticore - Review by DeepSeven

Manticore – (2006) staring Robert Beltran and Heather Donahue

TiVo grabbed this movie for me off Sci-Fi channel last Saturday night. I must admit, it was not half bad. The story, premise, and visuals were all done very well. I had to watch it one and a half times to really “see” the movie. I really could not understand “why” in this movie. Why did the plot develop as it did?

Here is the skinny.

We start in Iraq during the current War on Terror. A group of Iraqis decide to awake the “twins” which are the two manticores that are turn to stone by looking at each other. They do this with the help of a magic amulet. The magic amulet also allows the one person who wears it not to be killed by the manticore. One of the followers changes his mind and breaks one of the statues during the awakening ritual. This means that now the one manticore can never be stopped because the only way to kill it is to turn it to stone by looking at it’s twin. Or so they thought… Actually it wipes out an entire city of locals, and then kills off the Army guys that come in to help. Eventually, they figure out the lore of the beast and turn it to stone with a mirror. Get it? It thinks that it is seeing the twin. However the mirror breaks and they end up using a video camera with the viewscreen turned around. Boo. I will take the mirror, but a video makes it think it is seeing it’s twin? Come on.

What I do not get is the WHY. Why did this Iraqi summon a mythical beast to kill mainly his own people? He says it was summoned to free the land of Babylon of the non-believers, however it seemed to kill indiscriminately. The only person who was safe is the person wearing the amulet. When the amulet broke, he got eaten. It really seemed like a waste of a storyline. I would rather it been awoke on accident. Maybe they should have not awoke it at all and saved the money on production…

BEST LINE: “Throw the grenade before the battery dies!”

Sci Friday continues...

What is in store for our Stagate friends? Get ready for new Sci Friday tommorrow night!

Lost Finale news from Damon Lindelof

Lost Redux: Damon Lindelof Breaks "Radio Silence" to Reveal Why Charlie Died and More
By Kristin Veitch


So...whoa. Now you've seen it. (And if you haven't, you shouldn't be reading this!) Lost's mind-blowing season ender in which the rattlesnake popped out of the mailbox, the series turned upside-freaking-down and the producers bitchslapped us into a whole new off-the-island era.

Holy. Freaking. Wow. Could that just have been the best episode ever of the entire series? I, for one, have never been more into Lost than as of this moment (a terrifying thought) and loved every single nanosecond of it.

Kate and Jack got off the island, but leaving was a "mistake." Say whaaaa...?! Jack desperately wants to go back. Say double whaaaa...?! Kate lives in the 310 (LA's West side) and drives a Volvo? Bonkers!! And we have to wait till February to find out what happens next? Well, that's just cruel.


Thankfully, in an attempt to quell our postfinale jonesing for answers (I'm shaking like Jack in the pharmacy), my favorite TV mastermind to date (don't tell Trump) took time out of his busy schedule to tackle some of the fans' biggest Q's in a round of False, True or Hell No, I Won't Tell You and, more importantly, give the official word on why he killed Charlie.

But first, the reason this interview will prove to be a very rare thing in the coming months, as the Lost bosses enter what they're calling "complete and utter radio silence"...


Damon, first, I want you to know that last week, I hated me. I hated people who do what I do, because it honestly broke my heart that the huge "flash forward" twist of the finale was spoiled on a Website. I know you were trying extremely hard to protect that.
It was unfortunate. I think there will always be people who want to turn to the last page of the book, but I feel that those people are almost universally disappointed with what they read there, because if it's cool, they don't understand the context, and if it sucks, they feel like they've saved themselves time. But no one skips to the end of life. You have to live it, and it's just disappointing to me that people don't respect the integrity of the show enough to let it unfold naturally. There is a fine line between intriguing the audience with what's to come and giving them the whole shebang. And I feel the line was crossed with the finale this year, and it's really disappointing. Which is why, if we're going to talk about these things, I would at least like to come to you, because I know you'll handle it responsibly and not cross that line.

How are you dealing with the Spoilergate aftermath?
Well, with regard to season four, Carlton and I are going into complete and utter radio silence. I know a lot of people are going to be frustrated, but I think if things had gone a little differently in terms of the finale getting spoiled, we might have been a little more open to talking about it. But now we're all bitter. [Laughs.] No, honestly, the reason for the silence is we don’t want to tell the audience what to think about where the show is going to be next year. The way the finale concluded and what happens next is open to interpretation. I think it had a real imaginative quality to it that hopefully engaged the audience's imagination the way the show did when they first saw the pilot.

Does that mean you’re not going to answer all my probing questions about the fate of our Losties now?
You can ask, but I can’t guarantee anything.

Fair enough. How about a harmless little game of False, True or Hell No, I Won't Tell You?Let’s do it...

Lost returns in February.
True.

Lost stays on Wednesday nights.Is there an I Don't Know category?

The finale's twist, the flash forward, is something that you'd planned all along, from the very beginning.Oh, absolutely.

The show will flash forward and flash back from this point onward.Hell no, I won't tell you.

You are shooting in Hawaii next season.
Yes. Mostly.

Kate is pregnant.Hell no, I won't tell you.

The role of Jacob has been cast.
False.

False? Okay, interesting. People were having all sorts of interpretations of what he looked like.You do see a guy, but...I'm still sticking to my false.

The monster can reanimate the dead. Hell no, I won't tell you.

The Others are in danger of extinction.True.

The island's mysteries can be explained strictly by science.
Strictly by science?

Strictly. Hell no, I won't tell you.

The love triangle will eventually be resolved in an unambiguous manner.
True.

Michael is still out in the ocean somewhere.
Hell no, I won't tell you.

Tom is gay.
I'll leave that open to interpretation.

Ben is a good father.True. [Laughs] These are just my opinions, by the way.

Alex is actually Ben's biological daughter.
False.

The big set for season four is called the Ruins.
False.

You're a bastard for killing Charlie.
True.

Can we talk about that? 'Cause we fans need to know why you did it.Yes, of course. Dominic, Carlton and I, and all the writers, really felt that when Charlie threw his Virgin Mary statues into the water last year, that was the end of his addiction arc. We weren't interested in revisiting it and having him bounce between being drunk and being sober, so we began to really struggle with the idea of what was Charlie to play now. How was he going to evolve as a character?

At the very same time, we were starting to think about what the effect of the second season finale was going to be, with Desmond turning the fail-safe key. And we didn't want to kill off Desmond, but because this fail-safe key existed as sort of a last resort, we wanted there to be really severe ramifications for Desmond turning it. We didn't want him to get a free pass. And we felt that it would be cool if it involved time travel in some way. But instead of doing sort of a traditional time travel and creating paradoxes and all that stuff, we just did [the episode] "Flashes Before Your Eyes." When that experience ended, we wanted him to be able to see the future, and we thought it would be cool if [his visions] always kind of related to Charlie and Charlie’s death, as opposed to seeing 50 different things. That way, he would struggle all season with the idea of whether or not Charlie's death was inevitable.

Why Charlie? We felt that would be a really interesting story for Desmond, but the way it would affect Charlie excited us even more. We thought it would make Charlie enormously heroic. He is a character who I think the audience has really liked, and he has, during the course of the show, demonstrated real heroism. Like when he killed Ethan for example. At the end of season two, we realized that if there was any character on the show who would sacrifice their life so that everyone else could be rescued, that would be Charlie. What we hadn’t decided though, was whether or not Charlie was actually going to die.

So, when did you actually decide to kill him?Over the course of the year, we began to execute the story, and it was really working. I mean we just loved writing for Charlie. He had this whole new thing to play, and we loved how Dominic was working with Ian [Cusick]. Even with Hurley's more light-hearted story, Charlie's impending death gave it real gravitas. It was just a great storyline, and we were thinking, Is there a way for us to have our cake and eat it too? Can we continue prophesying Charlie's death but not actually have him die, just have him willing to die? But we kind of got to the point—I guess it was during the writing of "The Brig"—where we were all just talking in the writers room and we realized it's a cheat if he lives. It wouldn’t be fair, because we've made such a big story point out of it that Charlie now has to die. If he is going to accept his death, then he has to die. Otherwise, it's like, why did we do this story at all? We can't just let him off the hook. He has to die.

How did you break the news to Dominic?You know, obviously, we started talking to him before we wrote "Flashes Before Your Eyes," just so he would know what was coming. We told him that as soon as we knew definitively what Charlie's fate was going to be, he'd be the first to know. And when we made the final decision, we called him and had a very reasonable conversation. He was completely understanding and appreciative and accepting.

On a personal level, was it a difficult decision letting him go?Enormously. When you reflect back on the pilot, it was really Jack, Kate and Charlie's story. They're the three people you experience the crash with. They're the original sort of three amigos who go tromping out into the jungle. I think Dominic is, along with Jorge, really the heart of the show. And the idea of how would the show feel with Charlie not being in it anymore, that was a very dark tunnel to be looking down and it continues to be. But I think the reality is, after 72 hours of Lost, we have the idea of communicating to the audience that it's not just the Shannons and Boones and Paulos and Ekos and Ana Lucias who are vulnerable. Everybody is vulnerable. Not everybody's going to make it to the end of this journey. I think that was an important story point to make.

Are you expecting a fan backlash over this?
I hope so. I mean that honestly. I think that if people are like "we're glad you did it," that means we didn't do a good job of emotionally bonding the audience to Charlie and making them feel like his sacrifice is really tragic and heartbreaking. But Dom's work has been phenomenal, and in the last two episodes, he raised the bar even higher. And that's not just a producer trying to be generous to an actor who has now left the show. I think the proof is in the proverbial pudding. I really hope that all summer long, I am derided by people for doing this, because it'll mean that it meant something.

Message from Oceanic flight 815

The season finale is tommorrow night for Lost. Then no more until next year. Insider sources tell me that someone will be murdered by their friend and we will lose a major cast member.

I think that the introduction of the "Looking Glass" Submarine station is the best introduction since the original "Hatch" mystery in season 1. Thank goodness they will not keep it's purpose a secret unitl next year!

I will report back for my reflections of "Though the Looking Glass" (seaon finale) Thursday.

Review of Lake Placid 2

Thanks to Tivo, I just finished watching Lake Placid 2 today. It originally aired on the Sci Fi channel in the end of April. Now let me first say that I did enjoy the first Lake Placid movie. It was a fun Sci movie that wanted to be a horror, but knew it wasn’t really. It was a big budget film that made you feel good at the end, not scared to go in the water. Lake Placid 2 was nothing like the first one.

None of the original cast returned for this direct to cable movie. They played the “ Oh I heard a rumor that some people got eaten by a big crocodile a few years ago.” card. If you lived in a town of less than 500 people, you would know if a 60-foot crocodile ate somebody! Come on, nobody know anything? They put poor Cloris Leachman in to take up the slack of the vacant Betty White in the original. And of course nobody knows about the lady feeding four giant crocs in a lake that’s main revenue is fishing and tourism. Let us not forget our star of the movie, John Shneider. This former Duke boy is the sheriff of this small Maine town, where he too has heard the rumors of the past sheriff that killed a giant croc. WHAT? Did the entire previous population disappear? Was the name of the village Jamestown?

I have never seen a more casual group of people react when someone they know or a friend dies. Serious line in the movie “Dang, he’s dead. He knew what he was in for when he came out here.” And who can forget this favorite, “I lost two boats and a deputy out here.” These where not said tongue in cheek, it was either bad acting or just lets finish the day acting.

SYNOPSIS:
Giant Crocodile eats researcher. Researcher’s friend goes to the Sheriff to show him remains of researcher and get help. Sheriff and Wildlife Ranger (ex love interest) go with friend to see for themselves. Croc eats boat. Deputy shows up with another boat. Croc eats friend and deputy. Great White hunter shows up with tribal slave… They kill Croc #1, then Croc #2 eats slave. Sheriff’s son and neighbor girl go camping on the lake with her boyfriend and another couple. All of them get eaten by Croc #3, except son and neighbor girl. They all meet up. Sheriff kills Croc #3 with a grenade launcher. Surprise, Croc #4 shows up and kills Great White Hunter, while Sheriff and ex love interest are making out. Sheriff with help of son kills Croc #4 with plastic explosive and grenade launcher. Son and neighbor girl go home and make out. Sheriff and ex love interest go to lab with some eggs they found and stop on the way to have a date. Roll Credits. The End.

It is amazing how it did not make it to DVD.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GgBnJgzhbzA

Message from Oceanic flight 815

Well, last night on Lost we finally saw Jacob. Here is a screen capture for those who did not get a good look. Who showed up for a split second when Locke turned on a flashlight in the room.

I must admit, Lost is coming very full circle. Now that they have released an end date, I predict it will return to it's former glory.

Review of Reign of the Gargoyles

Directed by Ayton Davis (Boa vs. Python) Thanks to Tivo, I watched this Sci Fi Horror film one April afternoon and I was reminded of a much earlier movie entitled Memphis Belle. I really liked the Memphis Belle so I wanted to like this movie too. It had lots of great aircraft combat, but that was about it. This story centered on a crew of a B52 Bomber who are sent to carry out missions over Germany during World War II. They are the most successful crew, lead by the most successful commander, played by Joe Penney of Jake and the Fat Man.

Things go terribly wrong when the Nazi’s, who love to dabble in the occult, awaken a sleeping demon that has the power to turn stone gargoyles into living winged demons. These newly created flying demons, that were modeled after an older Edward Furlong, begin to prey on everyone and everything in their way. They kill Nazis, British, Romania, Americans, and can knock a plane out of the sky with one claw.

Our heroes crash behind enemy lines and meet up with the towns folk that are being oppressed by the family of Gargoyles that inhabit the nearby castle. Of course the Americans and British soldiers act as if nothing is out of the ordinary about this situation. Winged demons are apparently commonplace in Nazi Germany…

Thank goodness for the local villager girl who just so happens to know the ancient history about when this happened in old times. She remembers in detail how the knight slain the original gargoyle with a magic spear. Better yet, she knows that it was buried with him in a cemetery not to far away from her desolated village.

So after more casualties by Nazi’s and gargoyles, and little grave robbing, the flight crew possesses the magic spear, which can slay the master gargoyle and also repels them. Things are looking up for our heroes.

SPOILER ALERT – The fact that this movie climaxes with the rookie pilot ramming the master gargoyle with a German airplane and then stabbing him with the magic spear, makes this movie worth watching. He literally flies this German bomber aircraft into the rear end of this creature in mid flight and stabs it!

With all the action happening in the last 7 minutes of the film, the movie ends with little wrap up. Apparently once the master gargoyle is killed, the rest of the creatures automatically die, and then the rest of the US/ British army convienently come in and secure the area. ROLL CREDITS.


Best quote in the movie “Gargoyles? You mean like statues made of stone?”

Review of Dead and Deader

Starring Dean Cain and Susan Ward.

I liked this movie! This is a zombie movie made for the fans. Do not get me wrong it did not make fun of itself; it was not a silly horror. Dead and Deader actually mentions other zombie flicks (Dawn of the Dead – old and new) and uses dwells on information in them.
This direct to cable movie stars Dean Cain, the new sci fi golden child, as a zombie. Yes, a hero that is a member of the undead. He and his token black sidekick, who is dressed through half the movie as Michael Jackson in Thriller, are looking for the rest of his mercenary team that was returned from Cambodia to be buried. All of his team are now zombies of course, and they must destroy them before they create new “2nd generation” zombies. Also let us not forget that it does have Susan Ward in this movie, which makes it visually stunning. It is a great afternoon-killer type movie, so I recommend setting the TIVO for this one!


Since this original post in February, Dead and Deader has been release on DVD. I would recommend this as a BUY -since it will probably not return to Sci Fi.