Just because it’s funny.
Entertainment
Comic Watch [Sally Forth]
Once again, Sally Forth proves it’s one of the few print comics that “get it.” Most of the time, I’d rather play a game than go see a movie. Unless it’s The Dark Knight. That movie was awesome.
Link.
Soy a yo, Mario
Link.
Comic Watch [Fox Trot]
Bill Amend nails the popular webcomics good. I wonder what they each thought of being included in Fox Trot?
(I’d think it was pretty cool)
Link.
Comic Watch [Jump Start]
First he blamed video games for his dog’s obesity. Now Crunchy is blaming his dog’s failing grades at obedience school on… video games.
It wasn’t funny the first time. It isn’t funny now. Please, just stop.
Suu-per-mann!
“You are who you choose to be.”
I’ve only known of three movies that cause me to tear up at the end almost every time I see them. I’m not ashamed to admit that one of them is animated. As far as I’m concerned Brad Bird’s The Iron Giant is nothing short of brilliant.
I introduced this wonderful movie to my two sons tonight and it was a great experience. At first, they didn’t know what to expect and fear reigned through the first half of the movie. But just like their ol’ man the emotions of the giant and the quirkiness of the movie started to win them over.
Then the giant died. How do you explain sacrifice to a five year old and a 2.5 year old? I really have no idea. However, one thing that they did realize is that using guns in the wrong way is bad. Our oldest had been running around the house over the last month pointing at random people and and yelling, “BANG! Your dead!” He didn’t understand the concept of death, and we didn’t want him flippantly thinking it’s OK to shoot things all the time.
We have a moratorium on certain things in our house while the boys are awake. This mainly includes violence of all forms in the areas of games and television. It just doesn’t happen. I think it’s worked for us. Actually, I think it’s worked for me. I don’t relate well to violence. It’s not that it makes me violent. It’s just that it agitates me. It changes my attitude. It changes the way I view things. That’s not good for a person who’s the head of a household and responsible for raising two boys (especially in an increasingly acceptable, violent world for younger ages—there’s always been violence.)
In short, in generally affects me for the worst.
Occasionally, I’ll make room for Half-Life or a quick FPS walkthrough. However, the last FPS I’ve completed was Half-Life 2—it’s episodes and Portal variant—a long time ago (Call of Duty 4 and Metroid Prime 3 came close). I think I’ve just learned to pass up on games with a sense of immediacy, especially in terms of violence.
If you’ve got to have that violent rush, I say take a break for a while. Find a different genre to play. See if it changes the way you act; who you are. As for me and my boys, we will take it slow and keep playing racing games.
The other day, while traveling down the highway my son asked me to ram into a rig we were passing. Maybe we won’t play any Burnout for a while either.
The Forbidden Kingdom
Jackie Chan and Jet Li, together? With halted, bad english accents that can never quite get it right? And more fighting than you can shake a stick at? Be still, my kung-fu loving heart. I thought Jet Li was done making Kung Fu movies.
If Tony Jaa was in this movie, I would have died from too much hawesomeness. I know what I’ll be doing April 18th.
I am Legend’s real ending
When I commented on my viewing of I am Legend, I mentioned that while I enjoyed the movie as a whole, I really didn’t care for the ending.
Now, it looks like the DVD has the “real” ending that was replaced in the final theatrical cut. Over at firstshowing.net, they have a video of the new ending and it greatly improves the movie. If you saw the movie in the theater, it’s worth your time to watch the original ending. There’s also a little discussion about why this ending is better, discussing the fact that the whole point of why the book is titled “I Am Legend” was lost a little bit in the theatrical version. I really like the new ending. Tharr be spoilers tharr, so be warned, ye who click.
What if a game had an ending noone liked (I’m looking at you, Halo 2)? Would people accept an alternate ending (something available via downloadable content, for example)? Watching a movie with a new ending changes things dramatically. Would it have the same effect on a game?
Comic Watch [Jump Start]
Haha! Watching TV and playing video games makes you fat! Especially if you’re a… dog.
I know what Cloverfield is
I saw Cloverfield this afternoon. I loved loved loved it. In order to avoid any spoilers for those of you who may not have seen it, I’ll just make three observations that seem to be the common themes of the discussion of the movie:
- Everyone who had seen it before told me to sit near the back of the theater to avoid getting motion sickness. I call these people pansies with weak stomachs. I sat right in the middle and never missed a beat. Sure it was way frenetic and disorienting, even frustrating at times, but it was essential to the movie. Loved it.
- I also noticed an interesting reaction to the ending between friends and family that had seen it. The “younger” generation (we’re talking twenty-somethings) hated the ending. Those my age (we’re talking older than twenty-somethings) really enjoyed it. I’m with the latter. The ending was perfect. Loved it.
- If Hollywood made more chick-flicks like this, I would see them all. Yes, I called it a chick-flick. That’s what it is. It just happened to be made by someone who grew up on Godzilla and Michael Bay movies. Loved it.
Sure, there are things you could nitpick about, but I’m not getting into those. I remember seeing the trailer for this movie on the opening day for Transformers and have been waiting for this since then. I never got sucked into the viral marketing, but I still needed to know what Cloverfield was!
Definitely worth the wait.