I just started watching the 2014 Godzilla. This is my first time on blu-ray. The opening credits are a blast to step through frame by frame, so you can read the parts before they get blocked out. Some of it is just nonesene, but some of it is funny. For example, for one frame you see this:

The 'scientist' and occult author Richard T Jones has claimed unique knowledge of the creature's odd mating with CJ Adams.

Then they block out all but Richard T Jones and CJ Adams.

Another starts out as "Are these creatures real, or just men in rubber suits?" Then it all gets blacked out a frame later.


Just noticed another cute easter egg.

26:52 in, when they are back at the old family home in the quarantine zone. The camera moves in on an aquarium filled with gunk. A piece of tape on it reads "Ford's Moth" RA follows right afterward in different lettering, part of something else that was covered up by the tape.


Finished watching it. It was ok. Still not as good as the original though (not the Hollywood butchery with Raymond Burr, but the real, Japanese original Gojira).

My main gripe is the lack of giant monsters fighting one another. When I go to see a giant monster movie, I expect to see giant monsters, in giant battles. But every time a brawl starts between Godzilla and one of the baddies, or just with the giant bad guys, the movies cuts away to a feed on a tv screen of it for a few seconds, and then cuts away from that. In Hawaii, in Vegas, etc... I don't really care about some ugly guy who almost gets killed by big monsters over and over again, or his wife, who is apparently only there to prove that he's heterosexual, or his son, who is only there to prove his virility.

I feel sorry for Ken Watanabe. He's arguably the best actor in the movie (props to David Stratharain, he's an excellent actor as well), but he has nothing to do except stand around with his mouth gaping in shock and awe, and occasionally mutter "Gojira!" Why even bother hiring an actor of his caliber, if you are not going do anything with him?

Still, it does eventually have some giant monster action at the end. The new atomic breath was very cool. And Gojira is still the coolest giant monster around (though I do think some pilates might help, or at lest some yoga. Sorry G, but packing off a few tons would probably be good for your heart). I did especially like the acknowledgment of Godzilla being the savior of the city at the end. I think the President ought to give him a medal. Or at least make him an honorary Navy S.E.A.L.

Umm, yeah, I have been considering looking that one up and watching it. Just because of

HARRISON FORD!!

DANIEL CRAIG!!

IN THE SAME MOVIE!! OMG!! OMG!!

*faints*

It's a damned good film...I really enjoyed it...Don't take it seriously and you'll be fine... ...

I don't know who watches cartoons here, but I think the old cartoons were always the best ones. Getting in touch with my childhood . . . heh.

I feel old . . .

I never intended to take that one seriously. After all, I'm a HUGE fan of The Good, the Bad and the Weird! Now that's a movie to be thoroughly enjoyed without overthinking anything. The production values are outstanding, location shots are stunning, and the characters over the top. Plot? Who cares?


Love those Merrie Melodies! And I love the old Tom and Jerry cartoons from the 30's and 40's as well. That first one I remember all too well!

So who's older?

We watched Bachelorette and it brought up a lot of bad memories from high school.

"Blended" with Adam Sandler and Drew Barrymore is much better.

We went to see the musical, Wicked, the other night...As in, the prequel to Wizard of Oz...It was absolutely amazing!!...The two leads were spectacular (you will believe the Wicked Witch of The West is hot... ...); the songs were amazing; the staging and lighting was so wonderfully done...

We all absolutely loved it...Much better than The Lion King which we saw earlier in the year...(Which by no means less than pretty good and enjoyable and all that...But not...Great...Y'know?...)...


Oh, and saw Capaldi's first Doctor Who foray the other morning...And Karen Gillan's actually...The Pompeii one...Fantastic episode...I'd quite forgotten how good that one was...

Dear Gods Catherine Tate is gorgeous...*Sighs*... ...


What?... ...

Watched Hansel and Gretel: Witchhunters last night.

Bloody awesome film

Blacklist on Netflix.

Just wow. Haven't watched a show this intriguing in a long time. Every episode so far has been excellent.

Reddington is a very depthful character and the show does a good job of slowly peeling back the layers to keep you guessing about him.

That one is in my dvd queue, if I can ever get to it!

I just cannot get over how James Spader looks though. The last time I saw him, he was that bushy haired fella in Stargate. What happened!

He got old. as we all do. Eventually.

But he does not even look like himself. Dana Delaney, Arnold Swarzenneggar, and Keifer Sutherland got old too. But they still look like the same people, just older. Is that really James Spader, or an imposter?

Biology cursed him with baldness. No matter, his look lends itself well to the character.

I'm working my way through Angel again. I would've watched Buffy first, but between the high school setting and it being a little too heavy on the girl power, it gets kind of grating.

The second season is on TV here tonight and I'm pretty excited about it.

Reddington really brings the show to life with the mystery surrounding him and I love his wicked sense of humour.

I'm currently re-watching the last few episodes of Book 3 of Legend of Korra, in preparation for Book 4's imminent release. Mind-blowing stuff.

I'm watching Stardust.

Easily one of my all-time favourite films, despite how cringeworthy it is towards the start.

I need to catch up on LoK...like, all but the first three episodes of the first season kind of catching up...

It's a really good show, definitely worth watching; Season 1 is good, Season 2 is quite ropey but worth watching and Season 3 is absolutely fantastic. Given me high hopes for Season 4.

I just watched a film where a man's wife is brutally murdered by a serial killer and his unborn son left physically disabled then in a twisted turn of events, his son is kidnapped and he has to chase the kidnapper thousands of miles with the help of a mentally disabled woman.

The movie is Finding Nemo.

I have been watching Season 2 of Vikings. I have enjoyed it immensely. It is neat to see the grown-up Bjorn, played by Cato no less! I cannot remember the actor's actual name. But the first time I ever saw him was when he played Cato in Hunger Games. So that is probably how I will always remember him. He has turned out to be a cool guy.

It is also great to finally see Lagertha finally get out of the shadow of the men around her and make a destiny for herself that she deserves. I could see it back in the very first season (I think the first episode), in a little scene where she fondly runs her fingers over her old shield and sword, remembering times gone past, before she became a wife and a mother.

Athelstan too, really starts to shine here. His crucifixion was beautifully ironic. He is a man caught between worlds. With no clear answers. Now he has to make a fate for himself as well.

Rollo has a nice story arc here, as he finds not only redemption, but more importantly, he finds a purpose and sense of self that he never had before. Sometimes you have to hit rock bottom before you can get back up again. He's a great example of that.

Last of all Ragnar really steps up in this Season as well. He was an ambitious war leader in the first Season. Not only have his ambitions grown with his stature, but so has his brilliance. I just love how he deals with Jarl Borg. How can we have a viking show without a blood eagle after all!

Just watched the first part of The Hollow Crown, Richard II.

I'll be honest, I pretty much lost interest when Richard returned from Ireland. The second he set foot back in England it became overwhelmingly clear that he was bat-[censored] crazy, which kind of killed it for me. Still, I did better than when I tried reading Richard II, and was unable to get past the two ranting accusations at each other.

*Shrugs*

My Netflix queue just went into its annual hibernation because The Walking Dead and Homeland returned with excellent premiere episodes this past week!

Still working my way through The Hollow Crown. Watched parts one and two of Henry IV, much, much better than Richard II. Only Henry V to go.

The original Twilight Zone series. It's an alright series but some of their "life lessons" are a bit ridiculous at times.

Started watching Dracula a few days ago, the tv show with John Rhys-Davies-Meyers-King Henry VIII. It has me interested, though I am still not sure what to make of it. John Rhys' American accent sometimes makes me want to cringe. I am not entirely sure if it is because of the accent itself, or just because I am so used to his normal voice. That is my biggest complaint about the show though. At least so far.

I like that while his Dracula is a brutal killer, does still have some sense of empathy. Like when he found the woman he turned into a vampire locked up in a cage. The idea of him having a vendetta against the Order of the Dragon is interesting. My only misgiving is that so far the Order really doesn't seem like much of a challenge. I also wonder why did the Order make him a vampire in the first place, since among other things they appear to be vampire hunters?

I really liked his wireless lightbulb trick. That was something Nicola Tesla used to do. In fact, Dracula's professed dream of wireless energy was Teslas. I thought that was a really cool nod to a genius who has often gone forgotten.

I am really liking the guy playing Renfield. He is awesome. What a great direction to take the character! The guy playing Harkness seems flat to me though. Mina seems ok, but I am not thrilled with the "she looks exactly like my old girlfriend" trope. Haven't we done that enough times people? I was surprised to see Thomas Kretchsmann not playing a villain. Until I realized that he was! That is another interesting twist on an old character.

So I am three episodes in and still watching. That is farther than I often get with many shows.

Watching Dracula has gotten me onto a Victorian kick. Over the weekend I watched the two new Sherlock Holmes movies starring Iron Man. Now I am digging through to collection to see what else I have. Looks like in no particular order I will probably be watching The Raven, From Hell, and Lincoln next (yeah, Lincoln is not exactly Victorian, but it is just across the pond). Maybe even To The Ends Of The Earth. Which also isn't Victorian, but it was a good mini-series.

AHAHAH! HAHAHAHAHAHAHA! FUNNY! HA! HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA! I GET IT! HA! HAHAHAHA!

I saw Snowpiercer a few nights ago. It was alright. It reminded me of a mix of Noah's Ark and Metropolis (sans a female robot). It is nicely dark, with no one being entirely who they appear. Plus it had The Weird from The Good, The Bad, The Weird. Some of it really pushed my ability to suspend disbelief though. Especially the reanimating dead bad guy near the end. But all in all it was worth the rental.

I also finally finished Dracula today. It too was alright. But falls far short of being brilliant. On one hand it does an excellent job of portraying an antihero. Where Dracula is bad (he tends to be short-tempered, and people die in particularly gory ways when he gets mad), the Order of the Dragon is worse (they don't just kill people, but murder their entire families for shits and giggles). Like Nicola Tesla, Dracula is a champion of free energy, where the Order of the Dragon are a cabal of fossil fuel magnates *boo, hiss* It is definitely not difficult to root for Dracula in this show.

But I just could not give a crap about the whole romance plot with Mina and Harker and Dracula. Mina's character seems entirely pointless, except of course to serve as The Girlfriend. While Harker does serve a purpose and effect events, the actor playing him is so stiff and dull that I just cannot care about him one bit. I also noted that the show was not afraid to have gay characters. And was even quicker to kill them off. The only one who does survive the season isn't technically 'alive' anymore.

I started watching Penny Dreadful a few nights ago. Much better than Dracula! It has a cast of interesting characters, and skillfully weaves itself around some of the Victorian Era's most notable Horror Icons. Among the band of merry heroes (a term I use very loosely), are Dorian Grey and Dr. Frankenstein. Their ultimate goal to rescue Mina Harker from the clutches of the evil master vampire (I haven't heard his name yet, but I can guess that it starts with a 'D'... )

Eva Green turns in her usual cool, perceptive performance as a medium, who has something very nasty living inside her. I just saw the episode that showed her childhood with Mina. That was simply fantastic! No one here is very nice. Timothy Dalton is very cool as Mina's uncle, the aging African explorer. I find I like him a lot better now that he is older, than back in his Bond days.

What really surprised me is how much I am liking Josh Hartnett. I have never much been impressed with him, going back to the first time I saw him in Buffy. Too much a pretty boy. But like Tim Dalton, he is older now, the beard really helps, and he plays a very likeable Western Hero with some dark skeletons in his closet. William Piper even makes a nice appearance as a down on her luck Irish immigrant dying from consumption (tuberculosis).

The guy playing Dorian Grey doesn't do much for me. I keep thinking of Stuart Townsend's portrayal of the same character in League of Extraordinary Gentlemen. The movie wasn't great, but his performance as Dorian really made the character come alive for me. The thing is, I really do like the character of Dorian Grey in Penny Dreadful though. At first he just seems a bored, jaded, dilettante, as one would expect. But as we go deeper in they are revealing more depth to him, and an attraction to the darkness in some of the other characters around him. It is just that they actor they have playing him seems too young and boyish. It is hard to take him seriously.

And we even had a man on man kiss, between two of the main characters no less. And neither one of the died by the end of the episode!

With Penny Dreadful now finished, I watched The Raven yesterday, and finished up Amistad the day before. It seems my Victorian movie marathon is done. 8sigh* I have The Mountains of the Moon in my Netflix queue, but it has a very long wait, so no telling when I will be able to see that. So now I guess it is back to Rizzoli & Isles and Covert Affairs.

I watched The Crossing today. It turned out to be a surprisingly delightful little movie about Washington's surprise attack upon the Hessians at Trenton. Jeff Daniels does not exactly look like Washington, but - as always - he puts in an excellent turn as America's great general.

Watching the Desolation of Smaug, extended edition. Lots of fun!

Am I the only one who watches anything?

Today I started into the Appendices to Desolation of Smaug. What goes into making these LOTR movies is just truly amazing. The pickups for the movie took ten weeks. That is about the same length of time as the principal photography on an ordinary film!

Working my way through Midsomer Murders. Apparently Midsomer County has the highest per capita murder rate in the world.

Just keeping you company, Sage Rose!

That is the problem with every homicide cop show. Every place they are set in has to be death central. Granted, some places - like home sweet home - are like that IRL,

Just picked up X-Men: Days of Future Past.

Gonna watch that at some point today.


Edit: Just watched the film, bloody awesome.


Also, Blink is gorgeous And she thinks with Portals

I bought it on blu-ray a few weeks ago. I am in love with Bingbing Fan as well. And those portals of hers were just amazing! I thought they were the coolest thing in the movie. Well, perhaps aside from picking up the baseball stadium...

Definitely the coolest thing in the movie*. With Bishop and his gun coming in second. The baseball stadium I didn't think was that big a thing, not after seeing him do the same trick with a bridge loaded with mutants. The bit with the sentinels on the trains though, that was cool. Don't recall him doing anything like that in the earlier films.

That said, considering my opinion of First Class, I consider the fact that to be pretty damn cool.

Kind of pissed off with the dvd version I've got though, hidden in the gag reel, there's an outtake of Wolverine saying goodbye to Storm, like how they were together in that dark future timeline. But there's only the gag reel one, no deleted scenes!


*And the worst thing about this film?


And of course, the whole film demonstrates why Bryan Singer should be the only one making X-Men films. Everyone else just screws it up.

I finished all 10 hours of the Appendices for Desolation of Smaug a few minutes ago. It is just amazing the amount of effort that goes into making these movies. Now I am in the mood for watching the LOTR trilogy all over again!



There is a deleted scene on the blu-ray with them kissing and saying goodbye. That is what you get for going old school, and using ancient tech like dvd.

I think the inspiration for that was one of the X-men animated shows. There have been so many, it is hard to remember what was from which. I think it was the first one, from the 90s. In any case there was a Days of Future Past storyline in that, and in it Storm and Logan were married.

*Grumbles about Blu-ray elitists*

Missing that scene really bugs me



Yup, the one from the 90's. I grew up watching those, and have them all on dvd.

I think I might have to start watching them again...

I am watching Hercules, the new version with the Rock. It is a lot better than I expected. It has a sense of humor, and a delightfully cynical way of portraying the mythical figure of Hercules in a very down-to-earth manner. Including revealing that his fantastical exploits were part bluster, and part the work of his friends, as much as his own doings. I think the latter turned a lot of people off. But I prefer it over a Marty Stu uberman character.

It still isn't great. But it is entertaining.

The sad fact about me and watching TV is that I can’t stay awake. It’s the same with reading. The minute I’m off my feet, I’m out like a light. I’ve finally adapted to using my laptop at a standing work station. Maybe I should try reading and watching TV while standing up, too.

I have watched an average of ten minutes per episode of this season’s Doctor Who, though, and I was awake for about half of the season finale. I’m going to have to re-watch it someday.

I did catch a few minutes of Magnum PI today. Now I really want to watch the whole series.

I had similar thoughts about Hercules, SubRosa. I really enjoyed the interplay with the friends, and overall it was entertaining.

Maybe you should just sit on a less comfortable chair? You can stay awake when using the computer right? Perhaps sit in your computer chair? It is hard to slump over in one of those, like you can on a couch or a recliner.

A less comfortable chair is a good idea. I don’t have a computer chair or desk (I write, fool around online, and play PC games standing up at the end of my dining room table), but I do have a bouncy yoga ball I use for PT. I bet I won’t fall asleep sitting on that! Plus, stronger core!! Incentive to watch more TV!

And I've started watching the old X-Men cartoons again

It was inevitable really.

I've always had one big issue with the X-Men films: No Gambit, who was my favourite of the X-Men right from the start.

Am hooked with True Detective. This is still new even in the States, yes?

Yep, it aired earlier this year. I really enjoyed it. There’s going to be a second season next year, I think completely separate from the first season’s story. But I’m not sure about that.

Let's see- in no particular order:

Person of Interest

The Shield

George Gently (new episodes on Netflix- woo hoo!)

Miss Fisher Mysteries (see comment above)

Last Tango in Halifax

I loved The Shield, though the ending of the show was rather anti-climatic. Still, it was an awesome ride getting there. Michael Chiklis made an outstanding anti-hero.