Xavier Institute for Higher Learning Meet Your British Counterpart. A Ribble Valley businessman put in a bid to buy the Gwrych Castle in Abergele, North Wales.
G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra: I love this movie as a G.I. Joe fan it was a great live action movie adaptation. The action was intense, exciting, and did not sag for a moment throughout the entire movie. The Ninjas were awesome! Definitely an owner.
Aliens in the Attic: The trailer looks funny though I did not think I would like it enough to watch it in the theaters this summer. It’s on my rent list.
Wolverine and the X-Men: Beginning of the End: The movies have burn me on wolverine so much that I just don’t have it in me to get excited over this one. Not even a renter. If you have watched this let me know what you think about it.
If you really must waste your money don’t buy the DVD just give it to us at least it is going to a good cause.
Sand Serpents: I happened upon this SyFy movie while house sitting and exploring cable again. It was terrible retelling of Tremors which at least had characters in it I liked. If you are looking to torture yourself they are streaming it on netflix. Do yourself a favor and Avoid this one like a plague.
Sanctuary: The Complete First Season: What a great sci-fi show. I love how it started as an independent web project utilizing an all virtual backdrop style that looks great. A must own exploration into the world of the abnormals. In season one we get to see the Sanctuary, Witches, a folding man, the dangerous Kush, the ever adorable Nubbins I want one and I know not to feed it after midnight, Nikola Tesla, Werewolfs, Vampires, and much more. Starring: Amanda Tapping, Robin Dunne, Emilie Ullerup, Ryan Robbins, Christopher Heyerdahl, Agam Darshi. I can’t wait for season two to start on October 9th
Doctor Who: The Next Doctor (2008 Christmas Special): Victorian London is the setting of this “Doctor Who” Christmas special, which finds the time-traveling doc (David Tennant) arriving in the city on Christmas Eve, 1851, to investigate a string of murders — only to encounter a familiar foe: the Cybermen. He also crosses paths with another Doctor (David Morrissey) — whom he believes is a regeneration of himself — and together they must battle their common enemy, the evil Mercy Hartigan.
The Big Bang Theory: The Complete Second Season: This show is great geeky fun that is also a celebration in fandom. Whenever I want a nice laugh that still stimulates my mind with random science and a verbose vocabulary Big Bang Theory is my pick. I see a lot of myself in Leonard and I do live with Sheldon.
Star Wars: The Clone Wars – Clone Commandos: The second pack release of the TV Star Wars Series: Clone Wars. This DVD has four really good episodes “Rookies,” “Storm Over Ryloth,” “Innocents of Ryloth” and “Liberty on Ryloth.” Full of Mace Windu goodness a plus yet not the complete series. I already own the complete series through . For those wanting to get it on DVD I would wait for the complete season which has a rumored fall release, fingers crossed.
Primeval, Vol. 2 (Series 3): Is this series any good? I have watched some of the trailers for it but they did not get me excited to want to watch it. Evolutionary zoologist Nick Cutter recruits Egyptologist Sarah Page to the team, hoping her research can shed some light on the mysterious time anomalies that continue to deposit dangerous dinosaurs in modern England.
X-Men Origins: Wolverine: This movie was an utter piece of excrement. Don’t waste your time. If you are insistent on wasting your money then at least support us by buying it here:
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Culture
Ghostly museum image caught on film (via Yahoo! News)
12-foot LEGO Blockade Runner Readies for Diplomatic Mission (via Star Wars)
I can only assume that most X-Men, comic geeks (I use that term affectionately to recognize my kin), and general sci-fi fans were extremely disappointed by the X-Men Origins: Wolverine movie. Like many adaptations, Hollywood strayed too far away from the source material and left us with the husk of what could have been. More to the point, they introduced and set-up Wade Wilson aka Deadpool for a possible spin-off, which had now been “Greenlighted,” but pervert him to the point that he’s no longer palatable for us. Maybe not. I present to you, The Deadpoool Solution.
The Pitch
The concept is really simple. As the movie has said, Wade was the only member of the Team X (Yes, I’m referring to them by their comic name. We keeps it real here in the comic geek hood. Yea! Yea!) that could handle/survive the implantation of all the mutant powers. When did Wade become a mutant? Nevermind. We take the story from Wade’s involvement. To do this we have to give him some sort of BS power like hyper-agility, which will explain his sequence in the beginning (I’m trying to stay vague for those of you that haven’t seen the movie yet) and will somewhat explain his constant chatter. This power will allow his body to quickly adapt to anything new that has been introduced to it. This is not a healing factor.
Wade has been living a quiet life, like the rest of them. Unlike them, he’s quickly dying from cancer. An adverse affect of his hyper-agility, rapidly spreading the cancer through his body. Aware of Wade’s condition, Stryker approaches him about coming to work for the government again, and offers to find a cure for his cancer. Once Wade agrees to come back in, it all begins. Of course, Wade is completely unaware that Stryker is the one who had him exposed to a cancer-like agent to bring him in. Much like he does with Wolverine, Wade had to come on his own volition. Stryker begins testing his theory by giving him a bit of Sabretooth’s healing factor. Once he realizes that his plan will work (Wade’s cancer goes into remission), he has Wade placed on continuous sedation and begins with the mutant hunt and other experiments. It’s at this time Stryker decides to fuse Wade’s mouth shut using acid. (I am aware that the healing factor should prevent this from happening, but it has to be done, and it can’t be done prior to getting the healing ability.) He also gets the idea to infuse him with adamantium and decides to test it first on Wolverine; needing his healing factor.
Not wanting to lose such a valuable test subject and possible perfect soldier, Stryker has Sabretooth bring him a young man named Jamie Madrox. You may remember Madrox as being poorly written and misplayed in X-Men: The Last Stand. Madrox, also known as the Multiple Man, has the ability to create duplicates of himself. Not clones, but exact duplicates of the original. In the comic, he can’t control this ability as his dupes are spawned by kinetic energy and has to wear a special suit which allows him to control if and when a dupe will spawn; still brought about by kinetic energy. You can see where I’m going with this.
Stryker has Madrox’s ability synthesized to create a duplicate of Wade to do all of his experimentation on. If something goes wrong, he hasn’t lost the whole show, and can start over again with another dupe. The synthesized version is a onetime use, with plans to fully infuse the ability in him and create a full army once Deadpool has been perfected.
After Wolverine is given the adamantium Wade is infused with Logan’s ability and a dupe is created so that they can inject him with adamanium, too. The events of the Wolverine movie prevent Stryker’s plans for a Deadpool army from proceeding. Wolverine and Sabretooth fight and kill the Deadpool dupe and the Three Mile Island base is destroyed.
Wade emerges from the rubble of the base with no knowledge of the recent events. He knows that he’s cancer free, and that he has a healing factor now. He slices his mouth open so he can talk, and covers his disfigured face with a scrap of cloth he finds. So begins the Deadpool movie. Now, to help push him to that edge-of-sanity Deadpool we know from the comics, we can have him find the disembodied head of his dupe. Not knowing how of why he’s looking at himself decapitated, his mind would start to warp a bit. To do this, we scratch the stinger ending with Deadpool (since not everyone gets to see it, it’s easier to do away with) and use this. Trying to use the extra ending creates additional problems we don’t need; all the extra powers and 2 foot non-retractable adamantium claws would dilute the true character and weigh down the story.
The brilliantly funny people over at college humor does it again. I laughed so hard at this more reality based look at Wolverine’s powers.
I love superhero stuff especially the X-Men. In the comic they had the common sense to put in the blood that would inevitably occur when Wolverine sheds his claws. This is, as expected, one of the major problems with the latest catastrophe (I just can’t call it an X-Men film). For those of you unfortunate enough to have watched it you can now get come catharsis with this video.
The premise is a couple of guys save up to go through a medical procedure to get Wolverine’s mutant powers. They saved up all the money they could but unfortunately find out that the costs of the procedure will be double since Wolverine has two mutant powers adamantium claws and mutant healing. Which one will they choose? Watch the video above.
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Culture
New York’s Jedi Academy Teaches SaberSegging (via /Film)
Philip Pullman premieres in his own play (via GSFN)
Disqus Adds Mini-Profiles and Tweetable Blog Comments(via Mashable)
X-Men Origins: Wolverine is an atrocious X-men film and a horrible movie. If you are an X-Men fan please do not watch this movie it may bring out your inner Hulk. For those of you looking for at least a good action movie you too will be disappointed. It even failed to deliver an exciting action movie opening with 10 minutes of awkward action coupled with another 20 min of action which sags terribly in the middle only to pick up when gambit arrives and then deliver an ending that is less exciting then watching a drunken bar brawl. Please, I implore you do not torture yourself by watching X-men Origins Wolverine go buy X-Men, Volume 1or Wolverine: Weapon X and enjoy good X-men.
As a fan of X-men I will not list all of the inaccuracies here to keep from making this a multi-page review. Suffice it to say this movie failed to have have anything to do with the X-Men story or setting. It even conflicted with the previous X-Men movies. As a movie it was so terrible I will just discuss those failings.
This movie was nothing more then a series of poorly Knitted together scenes that were ripped off from other movies. To list some: Tomb Raider, There’s Something About Mary, Star Wars VI, Heroes, and the final fight scene with the boss was ripped poorly from Star Wars I. Dead Pool makes the same Darth Maul appearance then they copied the fight scene. Darth Maul fighting Qui-Gon Jinn only Qui-Gon and Maul can regenerate their stab wounds which gives enough time for Obi-Wan Kenobi to join the fight where they still cut Maul in 1/2 and he falls down into a hole.
Another glaring issue of this movie is that it somehow showed too much with out showing enough. Imagine a naked Hugh Jackman with full frontal that is Ken dolled… really, why not position the camera to avoid the full frontal or give Mr Jackman the balls to pull off the scene. How about up close shots of the claws ripping out of Wolverine’s skin and no blood, not even stained skin. The list goes on.
X-Men Origins: Wolverine failed as an X-Men movie. It even failed as a movie. I strongly urge you to enjoy good X-Men and either watch X-Men, Volume 1or read Wolverine: Weapon X .
Likes
Gambit was ok, not great but ok
Jen looked neat
Dead Pool was good in a short scene toward the beginning of the movie. (unfortunately the rest he sucked in)
Dislikes / Concerns
Failed to have anything to do with the X-Men story or setting
Failed to deliver exciting action
Failed to even be consistent within the previous X-Men movies
The majority of the scenes were poorly stolen from other movies
The effects sucked: they were poorly composited, looked fake, and had proportion issues
The pace sucked and was exacerbated by the poor transitions between the drama movie slapped into the middle of the action movie.
The setting had many issues that shattered the illusion: the scene of the secret base in Canada, even the tree types were in conflict.
The acting was atrocious especially the issues of accents: Gambit could not keep a consistent accent and did not sound very Cajun at best. I also need clarifying: The Canadian lumberjacks had a deep south redneck accent I don’t believe this is right. If your Canadian would you help clarify this for me in the comments?
The Visuals showed too much and too little at the same time.
Ken Dolled Hugh Jackman
The majority of the characters were flat, inaccurate, or superfluous
Failed to have a consistent or believable tension between Sabertooth and Wolverine.
Theater or Renter: May includes eight SF movies: X-Men Origins: Wolverine, Battle for Terra, Star Trek, Angels & Demons, Terminator: Salvation, Night at the Museum 2: Battle of the Smithsonian, Up, Drag Me to Hell. Will we watch? Will we rent? or do we even care?
Rules of the Game: Watch the trailers. Rate the Trailer. Then share with us your comments: does the movie, it’s trailer and buzz make you want to watch it in the theater, rent it, or not interested at all, and why?
X-Men Origins: Wolverine
Release Date: MAY 1st
Listed as: Action, Fantasy, Sci-Fi, Thriller
Studio: 20th Century Fox
Director: Gavin Hood
Produced by: Hugh Jackman, Lauren Shuler Donner, Ralph Winter, John Palermo
Written by: David Benioff, Skip Woods
Stars: Hugh Jackman, Liev Schreiber, Danny Huston, Dominic Monaghan, and Ryan Reynolds
The Plot / Story: The first chapter in the X-Men Saga, unites Wolverine with several other legends of the X-Men universe, in an epic revolution that pits the mutants against powerful forces determined to eliminate them. Are you concerned that there is no story in that description… I am. (Wikipedia) (The Official Site)
Written by: Evan Spiliotopoulos, Story: Aristomenis Tsirbas
Stars: Brian Cox, James Garner, Evan Rachel Wood, Justin Long, Dennis Quaid, Danny Glover, Amanda Peet
The Plot / Story: When the peace-loving inhabitants of the beautiful planet Terra come under attack from the last surviving members of humanity adrift in an aging spaceship, the stage is set for an all-out war between the two races for control of the planet. But will an unlikely friendship between a rebellious young Terrian and an injured human piolt somehow convince their leaders that war is not the answer? (Wikipedia) (The Official Site)
Star Trek (2009)
Release Date: MAY 8th (May 7th in some theaters)
Listed as: Action, Adventure, Sci-Fi
Studio: Paramount Pictures, Spyglass Entertainment, Bad Robot Productions
Director: J. J. Abrams
Produced by: J. J. Abrams, Damon Lindelof
Written by: Roberto Orci, Alex Kurtzman
Stars: Chris Pine, Zachary Quinto, Leonard Nimoy, Karl Urban, Zoe Saldana, Simon Pegg, John Cho, Anton Yelchin, Eric Bana
The Plot / Story: The origin story of Captain James T. Kirk, Spock and the crew of the USS Enterprise before they had boldly gone where no man had gone before. (Wikipedia) (The Official Site)
The Plot / Story: Based on the book Angels & Demons by Dan Brown. Harvard symbologist Robert Langdon finds himself in Rome, where he has to race against time to prevent the Illuminati, a secret society, from putting in motion a terrorist act that could destroy the Vatican. He’s aided in his quest by the beautiful Italian scientist Vittoria Vetri (Wikipedia) (The Official Site)
Produced by: Derek Anderson, Victor Kubicek, Jeffrey Silver, Moritz Borman
Written by: Screenplay: John D. Brancato, Michael Ferris, Uncredited: Jonathan Nolan, Anthony E. Zuiker, Shawn Ryan, Paul Haggis, David C. Wilson, Characters: James Cameron, Gale Anne Hurd
Stars: Christian Bale, Sam Worthington, Anton Yelchin, Moon Bloodgood, Bryce Dallas Howard, Common, Jane Alexander, Helena Bonham Carter
The Plot / Story: John Connor is joined in his attempt to defeat Skynet and its army of Terminators by Marcus Wright, a man who apparently has been rescued from the past, though Connor wonders if instead he’s been sent from the future as a foil to his plan. As Connor and Wright push deep into the heart of Skynet, they get closer and closer to learning the secret behind the organization’s mission to wipe humankind off the planet. (Wikipedia) (The Official Site)
Produced by: Shawn Levy, Chris Columbus, Michael Barnathan
Written by: Screenplay: Thomas Lennon Story: Robert Ben Garant
Stars: Ben Stiller, Amy Adams, Owen Wilson, Hank Azaria, Christopher Guest, Alain Chabat, and Robin Williams
The Plot / Story: Security guard Larry Daley infiltrates the Smithsonian Institute in order to rescue Jedediah and Octavius, who have been shipped to the museum by mistake. (Wikipedia) (The Official Site)
Up
Release Date: MAY 29th
Listed as: Animation, Action, Adventure, Comedy, Family
Studio: Pixar Animation Studios
Director: Pete Docter, Bob Peterson
Produced by: Jonas Rivera
Written by: Bob Peterson, Ronnie del Carmen, Thomas McCarthy
Stars: Edward Asner, Christopher Plummer, John Ratzenberger, Jordan Nagai
The Plot / Story: By tying thousands of balloon to his home, 78-year-old Carl Fredricksen sets out to fulfill his lifelong dream to see the wilds of South America. Right after lifting off, however, he learns he isn’t alone on his journey, since Russell, a wilderness explorer 70 years his junior, has inadvertently become a stowaway on the trip. (Wikipedia) (The Official Site)
Produced by: Grant Curtis, Joshua Donen, Joseph Drake, Nathan Kahane, Sam Raimi, Robert G. Tapert
Written by: Ivan Raimi, Sam Raimi
Stars: Alison Lohman, Justin Long, Lorna Raver, David Paymer
The Plot / Story: A loan officer ordered to evict an old woman from her home finds herself the recipient of a supernatural curse which turns her life into a living nightmare. Desperate, she turns to a seer for help, and learns she only has a short period of time before she is literally ushered into Hell. (Wikipedia) (The Official Site)