Nope, the Swedish Tennis Cyborg was First Contact. Nemesis was the final Trek movie, at least until the JJ Abrams reboots. It had Tom Hardy playing a young clone of Picard. The first time I saw it I could not understand why all the characters were acting so shocked the first time they saw him. It was only in the next scene I realized he's supposed to look like Picard. Well, he does not. He just looks like a bald Tom Hardy. But I still enjoyed it. I think of the Next Gen films, it was second best, after First Contact.

I still have not worked up the gumption to take another crack at Daredevil. The Punisher is the main thing making me thinking of trying again. I have always liked him. I didn't know Scott Glenn was in it. He's always fun to watch.

Watching The 100 again all the way up to the present episode. I gotta admit the show is slow to kick off but becomes awesome after a few episodes. Definitely worth checking out.

The premise is interesting and the young actors playing the teens who land planetside are decent. The storyline is great too with lots of character development and they mix it up enough to keep it from dragging.

I second this. Been watching the show since it first aired a couple of years ago, and it has come such a long way in pretty much every respect. The most recent episode in particular was very good, and the current story arc is really well done with all the twists and whatnot.

I just finished watching my newly arrived Nosferatu DVD. Yes, I ordered it despite having said I didn't consider it a 'must have' movie. After seeing it at YouTube I knew I'd add it to my collection eventually, so decided to track down exactly which restoration I viewed. I assumed it to be the one appearing as a recently published Kino blu ray. Only, excerpts from that disc show significantly more vertical scratches and other anomalies than the YouTube upload. I spent a couple of days trying to figure out why this might be so, at last stumbling on the reason at Amazon UK. There, a reviewer mentions that there are two modern restorations, the one used on the Kino blu ray and one from 2007. The blu ray restoration is significantly sharper with more detail. The 2007 has more anomalies removed. Both utilize the excellent original music score. I saw the 2007 restoration.

Even so I did not plan to order a copy right way. But . . . the old Kino Ultimate DVD Edition, which uses the 2007 restoration, is out of print. I found two on Amazon for $13US, then a jump to circa $50 and above. I decided to strike while the iron was hot. It was a good thing I did so. Several hours later both mine and the other cheap copy were gone.

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As for today's viewing, I picked up on more of the story than I did first time, which makes the experience even more enjoyable. Some of my initial nick-picks have faded into nothingness. I still wish a couple of the outdoor night scenes were more convincingly dark. Otherwise I can't really fault the film.

I suspect that those with blu ray players might be more content purchasing the more recent restoration, with its decidedly crisper image. (The 2007 is admittedly soft, though this varies somewhat depending on source material.)

@subRosa Do I remember correctly that you now have the Samsung 8500 UHD player? How's it working out? Do conventional blu rays and DVD look better upscaled to 4k than they did at 1080p?

I do have the Samsung 8500. For the most part regular blu-rays and dvds do look much better than with a 'normal' HD tv. But it has the same issue of sometimes being too high definition. Just like when playing some dvds on a regular blu-ray player, sometimes sfx and things like matte paintings that looked seamless on a dvd player, stand out as looking really fake on the blu-ray. But now it is sometimes things on dvd or even blu-ray looking fake on the Ultra Hd player. Sometimes even really minor visual issues you would never notice before become dramatically magnified.

Usually this kind of thing only pops up with older movies. For example, I was watching one of my Sharpe's Rifles movies (originally made back in the 90s, and now they are on blu-ray), and there was a scene where a man stands up and turns. For just a second the back of his coat became a sea of pixels. Then it all cleared up. I had similar problems with pixelation trying to watch Sicario. The disc had some scratches, which I think caused a lot of visual blurring and pixelation.

My 4KTV has a bunch of different viewing modes, including two custom modes you can set up. Changing modes can sometimes fix all the problems, sometimes not. The Sports and Game modes do the best with quick-motions like you get in action movies. For example, I was watching a preview of the final Hungry Games movie and there is a scene where an aircraft comes down to land. There is a line of mountains in the background, and the camera pans down to follow the plane across the mountains as it lands. On the Vivid and Cinema settings the mountains just dissolved into a blur every time I watched it. I set it to Game, and it looked perfect. I eventually set up the custom modes how I like them. But I still sometimes get issues on older discs.

OTOH, more recent movies like the Avengers ones look absolutely fantastic. Everest was just eye-popping on standard blu-ray. Obviously though, it is the non-effect shots that look best. Even Masterpiece Theater - shot on videotape - looks like you have a bunch of British people standing right in your living room.

The curved screen also works well I think. At least for me. At first I thought it would be disorienting, or that the curvature would warp or distort the image. But that is not the case at all. I think it looks better than a flat screen. That is especially when you are viewing from the side. The screen also seems to handle sunlight on it pretty well. I can watch with the windows open and sunlight coming through the windows just fine.

I've watched no feature length movies thus far this week. The last seen was yet another airing of my new Nosteratu DVD. I get more out of that film each time I view it. It's gone from being something I purchases more or less on a lark (though I knew I eventually wanted it in my collection) to possibly my favorite acquisition in some time. (The Sienkiewicz novels rank high on the list too.) Oh yeah, I bought a used copy of Master and Commander: Far Side of the World locally for a song. I've done nothing with it other than insure it loads and plays.

At YouTube I watched a video on film history titled Paul Merton's Weird and Wonderful World of Early Cinema. It's a mixture of hall presentation, skits by the presenter, and of course movie clips. It places a lot of emphasis on the 'very' early years, and details the work of some pioneers I was not familiar with.

I am also re-watching Gopher's Minecraft series. He begins as a total noob with no real interest in the game, and ends up utterly addicted. Here's episode one, in which he runs around totally clueless and accomplishes little beyond entertaining us with his naivety.


Thanks for the detailed report. Me, I remain undecided, chiefly because I have no plans to purchase either a 4k TV or A/V receiver that handles 4k or the new audio formats, not unless my current units go belly up. On the other hand, a UHD blu ray player might at some point allow me to buy movies on disc that are available only in 4k. On the other other hand, the vast majority of films I am interested in collecting tend to be niche products not likely to fall into that catagoy for some time to come, if ever. Heck, even now I see a fair number of silents available on DVD but not blu-ray. In any case it's not something I have to decide right away. Besides, funds for the next some months are committed to upcoming medical bills and a new lawn mower.

I keep forgetting to reply to this. Something that surprises me is the resilience of dvds. In spite of it now being 2 generations behind the times, there is no sign of any company stopping making dvds. In fact, season 2 of Turn: Washington's Spies just came out on disc. It is only on dvd. This is in spite of season 1 being on both blu-ray and dvd. So WTF? All I can guess is that dvds must be cheaper to make. Plus of course that blu-ray and 4k players are backwards compatible and can play dvds. Where the reverse is not possible.

Also forgot to mention. I have Master and Commander (sounds like a Porn from the title doesn't it!) on blu-ray. I have watched it almost half a dozen times, and liked it immensely. There are not too many films set in the Age of Sail. (I don't count the Pirates of the Caribbean films because they are more fantasy than reality). Plus it has Paul Bettany. An interesting thing about Master though is that the enemy ship was originally American in the novel, and they changed it to French for the movie. Obviously for the primarily American audience.

After supper last night I watched my newly acquired Criterion Collection DVD of Charlie Chaplin's The Kid. I ought to have held out and bought it on blu ray, but since I've no idea when I can afford to make the jump . . .

I'd not seen the film in years. Truth be told, I'm not 100% sure I ever watched it in its entirety. I only got to see it at all thanks to the 'fortunate' circumstance of being in hospital during a TCM Chaplin marathon. I caught most of the talking Chaplins, but missed almost all the silents. I did catch The Kid, but recall little of that viewing. I suspect I either tuned in partway through or, more likely, had to abandon the film for a test or procedure. I might simply have fallen asleep.

Being a Criterion produce, visuals are excellent. The original Chaplin composed music score, played by orchestra, accompanies the film. It's quite fine. The one caveat, it's a 1972 mono recording that, in my case, utilizes only the front center speaker. It's not bad mono sound, but I wish it would take advantage of my other two front speakers, which are full towers with better bass. The film is short, under an hour, but comes with lots of extras on disc to sweeten the deal.

My Chaplin exposure is decidedly odd. I own many of his very early shorts on laserdisc. I've seen (and remember) most of his 'talkies'. But I've missed out on his prime silents, the films for which he most renown. I saw Modern Times at a military outdoor theater in the Philippines circa 1973, but recall little of it. I own Gold Rush on VHS, but its quality is so bad I can't watch it. And now The Kid.

At YouTube I watched a fine, if a bit sugar-coated, bio of Mary Pickford, another silent biggie whose films have thus far eluded me.

The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly.

I've been doing a bit of a western thing of late

I'm not big on westerns, but did Love this one - and there were a couple more westerns he did that I liked. Sharon Stone did one western that I liked, "he Quick and the Dead."

Other than those and possibly Blazing Saddles, I'm not big on westerns.

I don't have many: Tombstone, Once Upon a Time in the West, Wyatt Earp, and a boxset of Clint Eastwood ones; A Fistful of Dollars, For a Few Dollars More, The Good, The Bad, And The Ugly, and [/i]Hang 'Em High[/i]

This morning I watched my Kino DVD of Douglas Fairbanks' silent Robin Hood. I've had this disc for some years and keep hoping I'll grow more fond of it. I doubt that's gonna happen. Of the four Fairbanks films I own, this is easily my least favorite. I just don't find much of interest in the movie, though it has its moments . . . all too few of them to suit me. Part of the problem is its music accompaniment. The disc jacket states that the film's original 1922 score is heard. That for me is normally ideal. In this case, much of the music seems uninspired, though I rather like the peppy opening theme. Nor does it always fit the mood and/or actions of what we see on screen. Possibly worse from my perspective, it is performed by a small ensemble playing mostly synthesizers or something similar. Whatever they are, the sound just isn't right for the Robin Hood score, which cries out for full symphonic orchestra. I shouldn't gripe too hard on this. At least an effort was made to use the original music, which is all too often ignored (assuming it survives). In any case, this is 'not' a film I recommend with any enthusiasm. The 1938 Errol Flynn Adventures of Robin Hood is, in my opinion, a whole order of magnitude better.

Westerns aren't one of my prime genres of interest either. But a fine film is a fine film. Westerns I rather enjoy include: Once Open a Time in the West, Shane, The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, Rio Bravo (silly but fun), and possibly my pick of the litter, High Noon.

"Hang 'Em High" is another great one!

I have a box set of the three Man With No Name movies on blu-ray. It makes for a cool Eastwood marathon.

I like me some Westerns. I love the one mALX mentioned - The Quick And The Dead, which is also a Sam Raimi movie. It has tons of people in it. Gene Hackman, Leo DeCapricorn, Russel Crowe, Lance Henrikson, and more. I thought Sharon Stone was excellent in it as The Mysterious Stranger/The Woman With No Name.

I like those you mention, SubRosa, especially the Good, the Bad and the Ugly. One of the best movies IMO. I've watched a lot of westerns but really liked only a few.

The Quick and the Dead is probably the only modern western which I find really good. Though there's another with Ed Harris, Renee Zellweger and Jeremy Irons, which would be okay if it weren't for Zellweger which I just can't stand.

Having recently seen the silent Douglas Fairbanks' Robin Hood, today I watched the 1938 Errol Flynn Adventures of Robin Hood on DVD. While I no longer think as highly of it as I once it, I still find it a fine film, with much to enjoy including its masterful music score. Other than in broad generalities, the two Robin Hoods are quite different films, sharing few specific scenes in common. The Flynn, btw, was at one stage intended to open with a tournament, which is how the Fairbanks begins.

I have Captain Blood coming in the mail from Netflix tomorrow, and The Seahawk is next in my queue.

I watched Master and Commander: The Far Side Of The World today. Still a fun Age of Sail/War movie, even after half a dozen viewings. It looked good on the 4K, except for one shot of the doctor standing on one of the Galapagos Islands, with a view of an inlet and more islands and ocean behind him. I could clearly see a difference between the ground he was standing on, and the rest of the scenery. So my guess is they shot him in the studio and then pasted that over footage of the real islands (since the Galapagos was one of the locations they actually filmed at). That is something I never noticed on my old "regular" hd tv.

I just learned that Toho is coming out with a new Godzilla movie in Japan this summer. Not sure when it will be in the States. He looks different from normal, and I have to say, pretty darn creepy.

He's definitely a bad guy in this one

Watched Nosferatu again last night. It gets better each viewing. I'm so glad I acquired the 2007 Kino release before prices went up. (The release that officially replaces it is now cheaper, but uses a different restoration.)


I meant to watch Master and Commander in its entirety over the weekend, but me being me totally forgot about it until reading your post. Think I'll watch it via computer rather than my living room AV system. I need to crank up the volume fairly high to hear a sufficient amount of softer noises. Doing so on my AV system makes low-frequency portion of the combat scenes too overwhelmingly loud, as I discovered during my brief test at the time of purchase. (I had headaches four days in a row from just the first canon salvo.) My computer audio system lacks to power to produce that sort of dynamic power, or so I hope for my ears' sake. Sort of ironic. Throughout my home listening career I've ranted against dynamic-range suppression, which occurs on all too often with both music and films. Now that discs like M&C provide decent dynamics my hearing is too shot to appreciate it. Such is life.


Interesting trailer. Other than showcasing technological advances, it did nothing to make me want to see the film.

One thing I find I actually like about the new Japanese Godzilla is the fact that they are actually showing us Godzilla. In the latest American reboot from a few years ago Godzilla is only in 8 minutes of the movie. Call me crazy, but when I go to see a giant monster movie, I want to see a giant monster. It was like the director was ashamed to show him to us. But this Japanese version is giving us a good long look at Red-zilla (or Daedric Godzilla) right off the bat, so I suspect that he will be in more than 8 minutes of the film.

Today I finished season two of Turn. It has been good, just as good as season one. They took some interesting twists and turns, all while remaining faithful to history overall. Or maybe I should say faithful to history as it is publicly known.

One example is how the series has portrayed General Lee (no, not that Gen'l Lee, there was another, far more dubious fellow by the same name in the Revolutionary War) as a traitor, while in history we know him simply as an incompetent. I have always thought that one of the main reasons Washington attacked the British at Monmouth was to destroy Lee, his only rival for command of the army. That is not something you see people admit, but when I look at how Washington gave Lee half his army to attack the British, while holding the other half back so far that it was impossible to support Lee, he was setting Lee up to fail. Of course Lee being utterly incapable of commanding the troops he did have insured his defeat when the entire British army turned around to attack him. Turn takes things further than that, and shows Lee having ulterior motives for his failure in battle, beyond simply being out of his depth.

Likewise, the whole subplot of Andre and Peggy Shippen has been really cool. It not only gives us a whole new insight into Andre, and Peggy, but also puts a whole new spin on the most famous betrayal in American history. I really like Andre in this show, and by the end of the season I could not help but feel sorry for him. I am going to be sad to see him meet his fate. Even before this show I always thought it was sad that he paid the price for Arnold's treason. In fact, I am liking the actor so much that I think JJ Feild would make for an excellent Ungarion in a live-action Aela show. Make those ears a little more pointy, and he's a perfect elf.

I did come across one issue with the dvds that anyone who buys season two on disc should be aware of. On the second dvd two episodes are mixed up. The second episode on the disc says it is Houses Divided, but clicking on it actually sends you to the next episode - Valley Forge. Likewise, the third episode on the disc says it is Valley Forge, but it is actually Houses Divided. So keep that in mind so you can watch them in the correct order.

Watched Master and Commander last night, via computer DVD drive rather than my living room AV system. Image quality suffered as a result, but not enough to ruin the viewing experience. As suspected, my computer audio system tamed the louder sounds heard during living room play-back. Too much so. The sound loses a great deal of its depth and impact, more so than I like. Still, it's a livable compromise, considering what little hearing I have left remains intact and my head isn't pounding to match the canons. As to the film itself, it more than justifies its expense, even discounting that I bought it used dirt cheap. It helps that I have a long held fascination with ships of the age of sail, the Napoleonic period in particular.

@SubRosa: Do you perchance refer to 'Light Horse Harry' Lee?

Oh no, I mean Charles Lee, a British officer who joined the American side at the beginning of the Revolutionary War. He had been one of Washington's rivals for command of the Continental Army from the very start. Everyone knew that whoever led the army was most likely to lead the new American government, if the Colonies won. So there was a lot of infighting over command.

Lee intrigued against Washington the entire time he was in the army. Going behind Washington's back with disparaging letters to other officers and members of Congress. Washington knew about it. He even read one of the letters that was mistakenly delivered to him. But he did nothing. I think Washington was biding his time for the opportunity to decisively defeat Lee.

But it was his Lee's own incompetence that caused him to be captured in his pajamas by British cavalry after the retreat from New York. When he had earlier been in command at Charleston he ordered the evacuation of a fort because he said it would never hold and the garrison would be slaughtered. The State governor overruled him, and the fort stood and defeated the British.

At Monmouth itself he was given an impossible task: attack Henry Clinton's army of some 13,000 with a force of only 5 or 6,000 men of his own. Washington originally gave command of the attack to Lafayette. But this was a slap in the face to Lee, who was second in command of the army. If the army was going to be divided, the honor of leading the second half should be given to him. It may sound quaint and silly to us in the 21st Century, but personal honor was everything in the 18th Century (it was slights against his honor that led to Benedict Arnold's treason after all). So he argued for command, and Washington gave it to him. I think this was all a clever ruse on Washington's part

Another commander, like Nathaniel Greene or Daniel Morgan, would have handled their much smaller force far better against Clinton's army. But Lee literally went into the battle with no plan at all. His troops attacked the British piecemeal, with no real order or objectives. When the British turned and laid into him, he ordered a retreat. He completely lost control of the men, and it became a disorganized rout. The day was only saved when Washington came up with the rest of the army and rallied the fleeing troops.

This all gave Washington grounds to sack Lee, which he did on the spot. I don't know if that was the entire reason for the battle, but I suspect it was a large part of it. There was no real strategic need for Washington to attack Clinton at Monmouth. The British had already evacuated Philadelphia without a fight and were marching back to New York - their main base in North America. The battle itself did nothing to change that. The next day Clinton took up the march again and continued on his way to New York - something he would have been obliged to do even if he had won. France had recently joined the conflict, which changed the entire scope of the war. Because of that the British had to pull troops from America and send them to the far more important (i.e. profitable) sugar islands in the Caribbean. That is what prompted Clinton to abandon Philadelphia without firing a shot in the first place.

It is true that Von Steuben had trained the Continental's over the previous winter, and turned them into a real army. And I am sure many of the Continentals, including Washington himself, were spoiling to fight the Brits. In fact, Monmouth was the first time the Continentals were able to stand eye to eye with the British regulars without flinching. They literally fought the best the British had to standstill - that includes regiments like the Black Watch and Coldstream Guards. After the humiliating defeats at Harlem Heights, White Plains, and Brandywine Bridge, it was a huge boost to American morale. But the battle itself was tactically a draw. Neither side really got the upper hand on the other. In the end, nothing really changed in the situation overall. Except Washington's command of the Continental Army was now unassailable.

Thanks to Master and Commander, my thirst for sea and sail has obliged me to start a Horatio Hornblower fest. Horatio is a very likeable protagonist, all the more because of his missteps and mistakes. Such as how he was captured in the The Duchess and the Devil. It helps keep him down to earth, or down to sea, as the case might be. Because his feats are also quite incredible. When I compare him to Richard Sharpe, Horartio is a much easier to relate to character. OTOH, Sharpe tends to come off as a Marty Stu.

Having recently watched my DVD of the Errol Flynn Adventures of Robin Hood, yesterday I watched the same movie on laserdisc, wanting to hear its commentary track, which I recalled being better than the DVD commentary track. To my surprise and embarrassment, turns out the two tracks are identical, save that the one on DVD is slightly updated.

I have of course watched many videos of various sorts and lengths at YouTube. The one I'll draw your attention to is a quickie by Metatron, a channel I watch with some regularity. It relates the legend, quite possibly rooted in fact, of a female samurai warrior. As part of the presentation, one of Metatron's female students models samurai armor. A quite comely young lass, I might add. Shows you don't have to resort to skimpy, unrealistic armor to flatteringly clothe female game and movie warriors. Admittedly, the particular armor worn here is rather beautiful in its own right, more so than a great many armors. Still, it can be done if one is so inclined.

@SubRosa: Thanks for the clarification and discourse. I've not studied the American Revolution in decades and recall little of it beyond broad generalities.

I haven't watched the video yet, but Tomoe Gozen has long been a heroine of Japanese history. She is known for cutting off a man's head with a knife. There were many examples of women in the samurai era who took arms and fought, even if not given the official title as samurai. There was Yamamato Yaeko, Nakano Takeko, Tsuruhime of Omishima, and tons more. The naginata was even known as the classic weapon of female warriors. You can find a ton of info about it in this little osprey book

And yes, there is no need for hypersexualized outfits to make women look good. A hot chick is a hot chick, even wearing a brown sack. In reality, female warriors wore the same armor that men did.

Now that it is out on disc, I watched The Revenant. It was ok, but nothing really special. Half the dialogue is just grunting or unintelligible gibbering. I was completely underwhelmed with Leo DeCapricorn. But then I always am. Tom Hardy gave a much better performance. In the very least, his character was more interesting. Granted that is partly because he actually has other characters to talk to throughout the film, so we get a chance to see his self-rationalizations for his behavior. Where as most scenes with Leo are just of him looking at the sky, or looking at the trees, or looking at the snow, etc... None of which conveys any emotion or clue into his thoughts.

I also noticed that Leo had a John Wayne gun (i.e. it never needed reloading). Toward the end of the movie he sneaks up on a French trapper and takes his pistol. He goes to steal the horses, is seen, and shoots the guy who saw him. Then he jumps up on a horse and rides off, and shoots another guy chasing him. This is in the 1820s, so we are talking black powder guns that had to be handloaded by dropping powder, ball, and wad down the barrel, and primer to the pan. Later on he is attacked by Indians, and again shoots an Indian when he wakes up, jumps on his horse, and shoots another Indian as he rides off. Maybe he actually had two pistols and it is my bad. But I don't recall ever seeing him have a second gun at that point of the film.

The wilderness is kind of nice to look at in some scenes. But mostly it is just grey and bleak. That adds more to the feeling of desperation and danger of being alone and wounded in the wilderness. But I think it also made going to all those places rather pointless, since as the viewer you really cannot enjoy the vistas, which would have been breathtaking if they had shot them on days with better weather.

The reality vs the movie also fails on a pretty epic level. The main character Hugh Glass is real. But unlike in the movie, he never had a son, and whether or not he ever had a wife was in dispute. He did survive a bear attack with the help of the other hundred guys with him. Not all by himself like in the movie. He was abandoned. But it was in the middle of summer, not the depth of winter. He crawled back to the fort, but wasn't pursed by hostile Indians like the movie portrays. When he did track the guy down who abandoned him, the real Hugh forgave him. The whole thing makes me shake my head. Why not make a movie about Jesus next, where he rips himself off the cross and goes on a killing spree, laying waste to Palestine before walking to Rome and ripping off the Emperor's head with his bare hands? That would be as accurate as the Revenant was.

I hope no movie directors are reading that Subrosa, don't want to give them ideas after all

I've just been watching Red Cliff, which is a damn good film

Just imagine Jesus with a laser minigun, blasting down rank after rank of demon legionaries! It would be epic!

I hope you saw the International version of Red Cliff. There was a shorter version they made for the U.S., which was not nearly as good. Funny how that happens when you cut over two hours out of a movie...

*shudders*

I didn't even know there was a longer version of the film. But I picked it up second hand, so I got it pretty cheap. Even though it's the abridged version I got my money's worth.

Watch the 291 minute version if you can. It is much better. Granted, it is almost 5 hours. But worth it.

I'll have to keep an eye out for it. And then find a day to spend watching it

Game of Thrones, season one.

So apparently the latest episode of Vikings (Season 4, episode 10) was the mid-season finale, and there are to be another 10 eps at some point in the future. That would explain why this season has seemed to go so slowly.

It hasn't been a bad season, but it (for me at least) hasn't been as good as previous ones. The last part of the latest episode in particular felt rushed and out of place. A pity, since Vikings has been one of my favourite shows for a long time now.

Game of Thrones, season two - not quite halfway through the season.

I have only seen a few episodes so far. I will have to start catching up. TBH, I was a little surprised that they are going back to Paris. Haven't we been there and done that? In the 'real' world Ragnar Lothbrok died shortly after the first attack on Paris. Not to mention King Horik was still alive at the time. I keep wondering if they are going to kill off Rangar at some point and fast forward a few more decades to show his sons all grown up. That might explain why they spend so much time in Wessex in season four, even though it is no longer relevant to the show. Eventually Ragnar's sons are going to lead the Great Heathen Army to destroy every Saxon kingdom except Wessex. Which we now know will be led by Athelstan's son. Are we going to see that in the show?

Heh. That would be the 'out of place' bit that's tacked on to the end of the last episode. I don't want to spoil it too much though, so I'll say no more on that.

Knowing that we're only halfway through the season does make me quite excited for part 2. Everything that's happened so far has been building up to whatever they have planned. Wessex is mentioned a fair bit during the last few minutes, so it looks likely.

I've done no 'movie' watching in some time. Been too busy watching filmed recordings of various Beethoven string quartets performed live in concert, discussed in detail in the appropriate thread. When hearing allows, a less and less common scenario, music trumps movies for my attention.

At YouTube I watched two documentaries on Richard III, one yet another take on the Princes in the Tower, the other an interesting discourse on the plausible consequences of his scoliosis (curvature of the spine).

Feeling a bit nostalgic, I'm slowing rewatching Caliform's now ancient Minecraft LP, make when the game was in some ways quite different than today, and each game day offered challenge and discovery.

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Between medical appointments one day last week I killed time in the mall, visiting Best Buy. Got my first in-your-face look at the new 4K Ultra HD TVs in action. Holy Moly!!! Those things are amazing, especially the high-end 75-80' models. One Sony and a Samsung really caught my eye. Simply stunning images, which I assume were true 4k source material. Colors really 'pop'. Some cheaper 4k models weren't so impressive, especially one that had obvious darkening at screen corners. I don't plan to buy one this lifetime, and the better models are out of my price range in any case, but darn...

I finally got caught up on Season Four of Vikings. I guess I was right about the fast-forwarding into the future part! I saw an announcement that John Rhys Meyers joined the cast for the fifth season, though they have not said who he will be playing. But after seeing the teenage Ivar, I am thinking he will perhaps be a ten years older version of Ivar. But it is also possible that he will play the grown-up Alfred the Great.

To be honest though, I thought most of season four was a letdown. I loved the stuff of Bjorn alone in the wilderness, and I loved Lagertha's wedding. But after that it all just sort of circled the drain for me. It seems like the writers don't know what to do with Ragnar anymore, or where to take the show.

Ragnar going back to Paris seems strange, as he never did it a second time in legend. It wouldn't be another 40 years before the vikings would take another crack at Paris. It was that attack on Paris in 885 that that the Rollo of history was involved in (who was not related to Ragnar Hairybreeches).

Even that nags at me. Because historically Rollo did not betray his own people to their deaths and become a solitary French noble. He and his entire warband went over the French side, creating the Norman people and the Duchy of Normandy.

The whole idea that no one in Kattegat found out about the slaughter of the viking settlement until a decade later also seems incredulous. Did they really expect to have absolutely no contact with all the settlers there for ten years? If the settlement had lasted, I am sure there would have been people traveling back and forth to trade and visit family members. There were vikings who sailed back and forth between Greenland and Norway just to visit family. The little hop to Wessex to is nothing in comparison.

Hopefully things will improve in the second half of season four. Maybe they are going to kill off Ragnar and move on to a new generation of characters - giving Bjorn, Ivar, and Alfred center stage. If so, there is a lot of material there.

I just finished watching one of my all-time favourite films: Dragonheart.

There's just so much that I love about this film.

That is on my Favorites list too. It was well done, funny, and just the right amount of everything. It is light, but surprisingly satisfying.

And Sean Connery is brilliant as a dragon!

And that dragon is amazingly done.

It has a really nice storyline, I think.

Definitely. And I loved the Old Code. Not just the idea, but what was actually in the code.

And Pete Postlethwaite as Brother Gilbert was brilliant

Agreed. Now I want to see it again,

Heheh, so do I!

I saw Victor Frankenstein today. It was an excellent movie. James McAvoy was absolutely outstanding. His portrayal of Victor Frankenstein is different from any I have ever seen before. He is a genius, likeable, fun, has no censor on his mouth, is not just obsessive, but often so erratic the point of being mad. In many ways he is over the top, but that is the very thing that makes this Frankenstein different from the others. He chews up the scenery. even when an eight foot tall monster is on the screen, you are still looking at James McAvoy.

Daniel Radcliffe also gives a solid turn as Igor. Or at least someone going by the name of Igor. Like McAvoy's Frankenstein, this is an Igor we have never seen before. The story is told from his point of view, and he is an excellent everyman character. We feel sympathy for him, glory in his triumphs, and can understand his loyalty to Frankenstein, and his frustration over Victor's obsession.

The monster itself is kind of incidental, though it does turn up at the end. But that is not a problem. This story is about Victor and Igor, not him.

I am watching The Prophecy.

"Ever cut off a Chinaman's head? They don't bleed. Not like we do.

Or maybe it was just the cold.

You could always tell when they were coming. Those songs.

They charge through the snow.

The guns froze, and that was ok, because we were better, colder.

At Chosin, we were colder than anyone."

I started watching Star Wars: Rebels again, starting with the original movie and the first season. It is a lot of fun going back to the original era of star wars, seeing Tie Fighters, Star Destroyers, etc... Today I saw the episode with Threepio and Artoo, and I noticed that the bottom half of one of Threepio's legs is silver instead of gold. That made me go back and look at the first movie, and it is the same there! I never noticed that before.

Watching Iron Man, since I'm about to go on another Avengers binge.

I have to say, Gwyneth Paltrow is freaking gorgeous as Pepper Potts

Darth Vader in the season finale was great. I enjoyed seeing Darth Maul return, too.