Summer Movies - 2012

Yes, I know it is only February, and yes, I am already talking about Summer 2012 movies.  If you don't like it, stop reading and go back to Words With Friends or reading about Facebook's IPO.

I'm a huge movie nerd, always have been.  With the exception of romantic comedies, I'll watch pretty much anything, whether I really like it or not.  And yes, though I may not like it, and may be forced to sit through it, you can bet your sweet ass that I'll have an opinion on it one way or the other.  The only exception to that rule is the movie adaptation of "Sphere".  Yeah that movie still makes me go WTF?!? (long funny story there, if you know both me and my two best friends growing up then you probably know the story, if not...uhm...sorry).

So here we go (by the way, this post is one of my longer ones):

As far as I'm concerned May 4th officially starts the Summer movie extravaganza this year.  Why?  The Avengers is coming out.  As a former, OK I'm still kind of, comic book geek, I've been waiting for this movie ever since the first Iron Man came out (the first Hulk movie doesn't count as it was utter garbage).  You've got a great list of actors in it, almost all who have been a headliner in a film for the character they are reprising.  Chris Hemsworth as the Mighty Thor.  Chris Evans as Captain America.  Samuel L. Jackson as Nick Fury. Scarlett Johansson as the woman of my dreams, er as the Black Widow.  Yes, there are a ton more great actors, and I haven't even mentioned the best, Robert "I was born to play this role" Downey, Jr. as Tony Stark/Iron Man, but the big thing here is the man who wrote and directed it.  Joss EFFING Whedon.  The man who brought you Buffy, Angel, Firefly/Serenity.  One of the ultimate comic fan boys who is alive now.  Yeah, I've got nothing else to say.  See it.  Love it.  If it sucks, which it won't, I'll eat my hat.

Dark Shadows - Screw you.  Not you the reader.  You.  Johnny "I forget if I was supposed to talk in a goofy ass British accent this time or not" Depp.  And you too, Tim "I married a chick with a goofy ass British accent" Burton.  Leave well enough alone.  Dark Shadows was a classic show.  Stop destroying things we love.  By the way, Depp, this goes for 21 Jump Street as well.

The Dictator - Why does Sacha Baron Cohen continue to be allowed to make movies?

Transformers 4 - Oh sorry, I meant to say, Battleship.  Sorry, does anyone else remember seeing aliens on the board when you call "B3"?  I sure as hell didn't.

Men in Black III - So it's been a DECADE since we last saw Will Smith and Tommy Lee Jones together (both two actors I enjoy a lot).  But, did we really need another MIB movie?  Sigh, yes, I'll be seeing it. *facepalm*

Snow White and the Huntsman - The second of two Snow White movies coming out this year (the other is at the end of March called Mirror, Mirror).  But this one has Kirsten Stewart in it.  Being all pale and unable to act.  She's perfect for a twist on the movie where the Huntsman spares her and trains her to go kill the Queen...wait, so this is basically Snow White meets Joan of Arc?  Oh yeah, this can only end well.

Madagascar 3: Europe's Most Wanted - *bang* that was the sound of Paramount/Dreamworks shooting a dead horse.

Prometheus - Yes, I've been waiting for this prequel/non-prequel/maybe it could be a prequel to Alien for so long.  Thank you Ridley Scott.  I know there will be no space marines, but that only hurts a little.

Rock of Age - OK, yet another Broadway musical making it's way to movie form.  And yes, I want to see it AND next time I'm in NYC I want to go and see it at Helen Hayes.  The cast, even psycho-looney-king Tom Cruise, look fantastic.  And it's 80's music!

That's My Boy- Adam Sandler used to be the funniest thing this side of a former SNL junkie.  James Cann is, well, James Cann!  Plus, it's got Rob Van Winkle, Vanilla Ice!

Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter - Who knew?  Actually, I did.  The book has actually gotten a lot of great reviews.  Written by the same guy who brought you Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, this should be, at the very least, good for some shock value.  Plus, I find it entertaining that Vampires caused the Civil War, and not economics, industry, and slavery.

Brave - I'm torn on this one.  Disney used to make masterpieces.  Now they make, well, mushterpieces.  What used to take half a decade to make, now takes a few months.  The love and work just isn't there any more.  Though I'm sure I'll see it.

G.I. Joe: Retaliation - Let's see here.  1) It's got Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson as Roadblock. 2) It's got Bruce "McClane" Willis as Joe "GI JOE" Colton.  3) It has ninjas fighting on the side of a damned mountain.  4) They took away Snake Eyes' "lips". 5) I'm pretty sure (and very happy) they kill off Channing Tatum in the first 10 minutes so he can go star in Magic Mike (opening the same day).  So ladies, go see him in MM.  Guys, I'll go grab some beers, meet you behind the theater to chug them and then we can go in.  Sound good?

The Amazing Spider-Man - FFS...why?  Did Raimi not destroy this hallowed enterprise enough?  Oh, I know what a good idea is.  Let's let a guy who has pretty much only done music documentaries direct it.  Couldn't do any worse than Spider-Man 3...right?

Savages - I know nothing about this Oliver Stone, California pot-smoking/growing, Mexican drug cartel movie.  So...yeah...onto the next.

Ice Age: Continental Drift - Remember that sound you heard earlier when I talked about Madagascar 3? Yeah, bring a bigger gun for 20th Century Fox.

The Dark Knight Rises - OK, by now you should know that I'm going to see this.  It involves a comic book character.  The main villain, Bane, looks like something out of a Mad Max movie instead of a luchador on the best steroids in the world, but I can forgive Chris Nolan for that.  After all, this is the same man who allowed us to see Heath Ledger's amazing final performance as "The Joker" in The Dark Knight, so I'll give him the benefit of the doubt.  Plus, Anne Hathaway in skin tight leather...

Neighborhood Watch - The cast alone in this should make it enjoyable.

Step Up 4 - Why, for the love of God?  How could Step Up 3, or any of them for that matter, have made enough money to warrant creation of this movie?  On top of that, how would it warrant being able to actually take up space in a multiplex?

The Bourne Legacy - Hold everything.  Another Bourne movie.  I can dig it.  What?  Matt Damon's not in it?  So they got someone else to play Jason Bourne, that's not to bad?  Huh?  You mean Jason Bourne's not even in a movie with his NAME in the damned title?  I need a scotch...

Total Recall - I love this cast.  I love the short story "We Can Remember For You Wholesale" by Phillip K. Dick.  I also loved the ORIGINAL MOVIE!  So help me, if there isn't a woman with three breasts in this one, I'm out.

Ok the rest of the Summer is pretty horrible until...

Paranorman - A cartoon?  With zombies and other members of the undead realm?  And it's not anime?  I'm feeling ill and may have to stay home the day this comes out...

The Expendables 2 - Don't you judge me.  I liked the original.  It was so stupid and outrageous it was great.  I just hope the cameos in this one are better, or longer.  Arnie needs the money now right?

Super Bowl XLVI

So, as much as I am a red-blooded American male, I'm not a huge fan of the Super Bowl.  Why? Well, I'm a New Orleans Saints fan through and through.  And unless they make it to the "Big Show", I don't really have a dog in that fight (nice old Southern phrase which means basically I don't give a damn).

Of course, like all those who didn't really care what was going on, I do enjoy the Super Bowl commercials.  It's fun to see the companies who shell out millions of dollars for 30 second spots during the most televised event of the year.  It's even more fun to SEE what they paid those millions of dollars for.  Most of the time it's crap that leaves you going "what the HELL did I just see?" and scratching your head, or dropping your beer.  By far, my favorite was the M&M commercial with "Red" showing up and stripping off his candy coating because he thought that "Brown" had done the same.  Yeah, I laughed my ass off on that one.

Besides that, it was just a fun evening spent with my extremely tall best friend, his EXTREMELY pregnant wife, and my cute as hell godson. 

Who knows, maybe next year Brees and the boys will pull it off and make it to the game.  Came close this year, but just wasn't quite enough.

Oh, and my eyes cannot un-see nor my ears un-hear the atrocity that was Madonna's half-time show.  Though I was tempted to grab hot coals for my eyes and sharp pencils for my ears.

A Crime Lex Luthor Would be Aghast At!

As a comic book geek for many, many years (mostly thanks to my older brother), I've got a soft spot for anyone who reads them.  I spent countless hours growing up, and still do occasionally, getting lost 32-pages at a time in the worlds of DC, Marvel, Image, Dark Horse and many other publishers.

So when my brother sent me this article about a scumbag who stole a Superman collection from a mentally disabled man, it really got to me.

What right does another human being have to do this to someone?  Let alone someone who has a diminished mental capacity.  It makes me sick to my stomach that this son of a bitch is out there walking around, probably having hocked all of the collection for money for drugs or some other worthless thing. 
 

I'm sure some of the people reading this think that comics are just some "other worthless thing".  If so that is your opinion, but please never come back to this blog.  "Y'all ain't welcome here no mo'".  Comics can be as engaging as any good movie (often better), as thrilling as any good book (but with pictures!), or as mesmerizing as any work of art.  They help bolster the love of the written word.  They provide a place to escape to when things aren't always the best.  They let you dazzle your friends with amazing knowledge of how certain superheroes came to be (OK, not so great...but still kinda cool in my book).

I plan on going through my old collection in the next couple of days and grabbing some old issues of Superman to send to Mike.  If any of you out there would like to do the same, or just send him a kindness (which LORD knows this world could use more of) please send to:

Mike Meyer c/o Bill Smith
7041 Kingsbury Blvd.
St. Louis, Mo. 63130

Things Pissing Me Off This Week #1

Thought I'd try another thing and combine two or three "short posts" into one and see what it looks like.

Item #1:  Wells Fargo has joined JP Morgan Chase in tacking on a $3/month fee to debit card users.  Why? Because the government did something smart and said that banks can only charge credit card companies a max of $0.21 per charge on a debit card.  And in retaliation the banks are going to start charging this fee so that they can get the money out of their clients.  What I'm getting out of this is I'll start carrying cash more or writing checks and cancel my debit card if my bank decides to go this way.

Item #2:  A woman in Houston was ejected from a restaurant because she tweeted that the bartender at the restaurant was a "twerp".  Apparently the manager was to busy checking out Twitter instead of managing his restaurant, saw the tweet, and then had the woman, a paying customer, thrown out.  I have no idea what her reason was for calling the bartender a twerp.  I've had good friends who are bartenders and it can be a really crappy job at times, but if the bartender was younger than me and acting like a twerp I'm sure I'd have done similar.  Maybe the GM should spend a little more time making sure his employees are up to par and not goofing off on the internet or on his cell phone.

Item #3:  All this "Flash Mob" crime stuff going on at convenience stores and similar.  Yes, kids are smart these days and are using Twitter and Facebook and whatever to get together and do Flash Mob crap, when I was younger the same thing was done with mass-texting people.  How does this get stopped?  Store owners hiding a "crowd pleasers" (shotguns) behind the counter and taking out one of the punks will put a stop to this crap REAL fast.

Stupid is Stupid...No Matter How Hot You Are

My best friend pointed this one out to me, as he also pointed out to me that my blog was seriously lacking in content lately, so thanks Stretch.

A fellow alum of my alma mater, who happens also to be a former Playboy Playmate and involved in a little scandal at our alma mater involving scantily clad photos in a locker room, was arrested on August 10th at Orlando International Airport for trying to board a plan with a LOADED revolver.

The article can be found at that pinnacle of unbiased news media, the Orlando Sentinel, here.

OK, she had a CCW, which allows her to carry a concealed handgun.  But last I checked you had to pass a class to get that permit.  I'm pretty sure part of that class went over WHERE it is legal and illegal to carry your weapon.  An airport, with a bunch of police officers and TSA agents is one of those places that most people with half a brain would stop and think "Hmm, this may be one of those places I'm not allowed to carry my gun.  Oh wait, it says so right THERE ON THAT SIGN!"


So once again, no matter how hot you are.  No matter if you've been in Playboy or not and had Hef rubbing you up and down with oil.  And no matter if you do have a license which allows you to carry your concealed handgun, loaded with hollow-point rounds in most places.  You are not allowed to take a handgun on an airplane or into an airport unless you have it in a case and it is going in the belly of the damned plane.

Oh wait, she's blonde?  She's forgiven, she didn't know any better.

So Long Space Shuttle

At just before 6:00AM this morning I was awoken by the last sonic boom of the last space shuttle, Atlantis, that would ever re-enter, or leave for that matter, the Earth's atmosphere.

It was very depressing to think that we, the United States of America, who have led space travel, space exploration, and just about anything else that has the word "space" in its name, for the last 50 years, are no longer the leaders.

I really don't have much to else to say on this.  I blame one person's administration for this.  And the THOUSANDS of jobs that are lost because of it.

God bless all the men and women of the NASA Astronaut Corps who have helped get us to the stars, land on the moon, and discover more about this amazing "space" around us.

Ad astra per aspera.

-UA

Cashing in on the Law

Living in Central Florida, I've had the "privilege" of putting up with the "she who shall not be named" (Casey Anthony for those of you outside of my fair state) murder trial over the last 3 years.  Thank God it is finally over...mostly.

Apparently, some of the jurors in the case who have stepped forward (Judge Fred Sanford...I mean Judge Belvin Perry has not released the jurors names as of yet) are going to be writing books, selling their stories to Hollywood (or Bollywood for that matter), etc.  I have no issue with this, but it seems State Rep. Scott Randolph, D-Orlando, does.

"The bill Randolph intends to introduce during the 2012 legislative session would prevent jurors from making money or receiving compensation in exchange for information about the trial in which they participated". (Orlando Sentinel)  If you want to read the full story go here.

Why this is bothering Rep. Randolph I really have no idea.  We took about 2 months out of the lives of these people so that they could do their "civic" duties.  They were sequestered, which in this day and age of technology and news being everywhere is tantamount to being a prisoner themselves.  I personally will not buy anything having to do with this trial as I'm ready for the area to get back to normal (not saying that Central Florida is ever TRULY normal), but see no issue in these people coming out and making some cash on doing what we ask them as citizens.  Lawmakers, politicians, and many others do it every day.  Why not the "regular" people?

-UA