Weird Denizens of the West Village

These are the kind of people I live with.

As I write this and ponder whether or not to be actually productive today and clean the house instead of playing Halo, my neighbor’s new dog is barking loudly at other dogs, passing cars, or pretty much anything that gets its goat. I’ve been hoping it wasn’t his dog, that maybe he was taking care of a friend’s while they’re out of town, perhaps even someone in the building (haven’t seen the greyhound that lives down the hall or the guy who owns it in a while), but considering it’s been here for about a week now, the situation is looking grim. It’s almost as if the guy, a 40-something divorcee, father and party-planner, wants to annoy me more than he already does. And if that’s the case, he’s doing a fantastic job.

Ever since I moved into the West Village over a year ago, I have been fascinated by the bizarre social dynamics that occur here. In the past, the West Village was known as a bohemian enclave and sanctuary for gays, full of art, culture, and maze-like streets. But ever since Giuliani cracked down on minorities crime and convinced Europeans that they should spend their hard-earned Euros on overpriced food, lodging and clothes, the face of the Village has changed dramatically. While it’s still home to homosexuals and artists alike, it’s now overflowing with illogically beautiful models, celebrities, expatriates, and trust-fund hipsters. The original bohemian caste has been pushed aside and now makes up a bizarre minority.

These are the kind of people I live with in my overpriced tenement building, people who are so obsessed with the idea of the West Village, that they’re willing to pay several G’s to live in what was designed for large immigrant families in the mid-19th Century. These are the kind of people who are steamrolling into their 50s and yet still think, deep down, that they’re 21 years old. These are the kind of people who think Kings of Leon are the hip new Indie band. These are the kind of people who think it’s okay to own a dog, even when their living space is barely large enough to fit themselves in, and is on the fifth floor, thus dooming their poor animal to a life of cabin fever and hip replacements. These are the kind of people who New York City pushes over the brink into madness.

Now I know what many of you are saying: Alex, you yourself are a bit of a trust-fund hipster, you’re living off your parents and occupy an apartment in one of the best neighborhoods in the city. What do you have to complain about? I’m not complaining. I love the Village. What’s causing this angst is a combination of anthropological fascination, and pure hatred for my noisy neighbor. I think it’s crazy that these old bastards are still willing to sacrifice living space and convenience just so they can tell their friends at their dead-end job that they live in the Village, when they could afford an apartment that’s two to three times bigger in Brooklyn. But mostly I just find the melting pot nature of the neighborhood to be engaging from an intellectual standpoint. It still retains the luster of its bygone days, but like everywhere else in the city, it too has become a victim of gentrification. Back in the day, the Village was one of the city’s centers for counterculture. Now it’s where tourists go because they think it’s a counterculture. It’s a Disney-fied theme park like the East Village and Williamsburg that caters more to tourists than to its own inhabitants.

But that’s not what’s really bothering me. What’s bothering me is this fucking dog. I want to sneak in through my neighbor’s window (he always leaves it open) and poison the pure creature, so I can finally have a train of thought that’s not interrupted by ROFF ROFF ROFF ROFF!!! I want the son of a bitch to get some fucking carpets and take his goddamn shoes off, so it doesn’t sound like a fucking Nazi brigade is marching across my apartment all the time. I want him to stop playing loud music, TV and videogames after hours like he promised to, or stop being overly dramatic and making moaning sounds akin to Chewbacca whenever he has an orgasm. I want him to talk in a speaking voice when he’s indoors instead of yelling like he’s at a Journey concert. I want him to be a normal person. I want someone to open his eyes and say: “See!! This isn’t the New York you grew up in!! That New York is dead!! Get over it and grow the fuck up!!”

WORST NEIGHBOR EVER.

DECAPITATION!!!!!! -Brütal Legend Review

XBOX 360, Rated M for Mature.

In my Top 100 Favorite Videogame List I included several games that prolific designer Tim Schafer was involved in, including two he was project lead on: Grim Fandango and Psychonauts. So I’m obviously a fan. Schafer is the master of adventure games. He knows that some of the most important parts of a videogame are story and voice acting, and always bases his gameplay around them. His games span many genres, from classic point and click adventure puzzles, to platformers, and now, the real time strategy game.

Prior to Brütal Legend, all the RTS games I’d played on the 360 sucked. Halo Wars was supposed to be the RTS revolution for consoles, but I found the demo frustrating and outdated and passed on it. I had always wanted to play the LOTR Battle for Middle-Earth series, but the port of the sequel was clunky and I stopped playing it after about a week, then traded it in to purchase this game. I love Civilization: Revolution, but that’s turn-based and still works in a controller-based format. Brütal Legend is the first game I’ve played that successfully brings the RTS to the console, and it does so very well. The campaign, which is hilarious thanks to the excellent voicework of Jack Black and others, is great and tells a very original and badass story. It also acts as a tutorial for the multiplayer, called “stage battles,” which are basically very fast-paced and satisfying RTS brawls, with some RPG elements as well as some beat em’ up. You command your troops by flying above the battlefield, and can raise and lower yourself to get a better vantage point. Troops are purchased using a classic resource system, only instead of lumber and gold, it’s fans, green spirits that come out of vents in the ground. The commands at your disposal are very basic, and your army is semi-intelligent at best, but what’s awesome is how the game allows you to jump into the battle and use your superior fighting combos to decimate the enemy. The RPG side of the experience comes in the form of spells, or in this case, guitar solos. There’s an immense attention to detail in the art design, and what’s sweet is how all these classic gaming tropes are given new spins thanks to the game’s heavy metal theme.

Having a love for the heavy metal genre isn’t necessary to enjoy the game, although if you don’t like it at all, Brütal Legend might not be for you. I had a mild interest in the music prior to playing this, and now I’m obsessed. The soundtrack is fantastic and includes songs from practically every metal subgenre. Overall, this is a fantastic experience, with lots of replayability. If you’re looking for something a little different, a game that may not be the most innovative product on the marketplace but has an entertaining story, then this is well worth the $59.99.

SCORE:8.9

In other videogame news, there’s several games I’ve played recently that would be eligible to enter my Top 100 list, including this one. In addition, I’d add Batman: Arkham Asylum and Condemned 2: Bloodshot, both excellent games, although the former is much better. In fact it’s the best in this trio.

On the Horizon

There’s a lot of great games coming out over the next few months, starting with the DLC add-on Grand Theft Auto IV: The Ballad of Gay Tony, which hits Xbox Live this Thursday, October 29th. After that, my next big release is Assassin’s Creed II (11.17.2009), which I’m practically frothing at the mouth for. Most gamers are probably pissing themselves waiting for Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 (11.10.2009), although ACII’s story and improved variety of gameplay has won me over. I’ll get MW2, but not until December.

A new year brings new games, and January 26th will herald the arrival of Mass Effect 2, the highly-anticipated sequel to the fantastic RPG (who am I kidding? All of these games are highly-anticipated!). February sees two equally massive releases, both sequels: Bioshock 2 (02.09.2009) and Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell: Conviction (02.23.2009). Other games of interest: Perfect Dark on the Xbox Live Arcade, Left 4 Dead 2 (11.17.2009), The Saboteur (12.08.2009), Starcraft II: Wings of Liberty, Alan Wake, Dante’s Inferno (02.09.2010), Dead Rising 2 (02.10.2010), Lost Planet 2 (02.23.2010), Super Street Fighter IV (3.23.2010), Alien vs. Predator (03.31.2010), Max Payne 3 (06.30.2010), Fable III, Halo: Reach, Diablo III and Metal Gear Solid: Rising.

Remember, videogame release dates are subject to change. Constantly.

Where the Weird Things Are

After I realized Avatar was going to be the film Ewoks with blue cats and Halo soldiers, Spike Jonze first film since Adaptation became my new must-see movie of the fall season. An early test of the creatures I saw in 2008 was what first got me excited, as did reports of a bizarrely dark film that frightened studio Warner Brothers and test audiences alike. The teaser trailer, set to an orchestral version of The Arcade Fire’s “Wake Up” looked incredible, and I was sure the film was going to be the masterpiece of 2009, until my friend Rob Malone mentioned an aspect of it he had noticed that I hadn’t. He said it looked too “indie rock,” as if Jonze had taken Maurice Sendak’s work and transplanted it into a hand-held, filtered HD art film custom-tailored for Gen X Williamsburgers and their ironic Misfits T-shirt-wearing babies. Immediately his observation hit a chord with me, perhaps because if the trailer was any indication, he was right.

It didn’t stop me from going to see it, especially when I got invited to a free screening last Wednesday at MoMa as part of their new Film+ membership, which my father recently got me (thanks, Dad! Man, you’re awesome). The membership promises future pre-screenings (the curator mentioned one for Peter Jackson’s upcoming The Lovely Bones), so next time I’ll try and get a review out before the film’s release, and not be lazy. Where the Wild Things Are was even presented by star Katherine Keener, another added bonus.

It’s been four days since I saw the film and I’m still not entirely sure how I feel about it. It’s certainly not the masterpiece I think anyone was hoping for- it has its flaws- but there’s still something very honest and true and its core, something that really touched me. I enjoyed the fully live-action bits at the beginning, especially the way Jonze managed to convey the current state of the family without any unnecessary expository dialogue. I was actually expecting the film to be more vague and metaphorical, but once Max starts palling around with the overly depressed monsters, it’s immediately apparent what the connections between the fantasy world and his real life are. All of the monsters represent facets of his personality, or those of his family members. The conflict between Carol and KW seemed like a mix between Max’s parents’ divorce and his sister’s newfound friends (i.e. Bob & Terry the owls). Alexander acted as Max’s fears of being ignored or unheard, while Judith came off as the bad side of his mother. Most important of all is Carol, who is Max’s own “wild thing,” the rambunctious side of his personality that he ultimately has to abandon at the end in order to grow up.

The film was, more than anything else, weird. Really, really weird. While visually spectacular (way to go Henson company!), the film undoubtedly dipped in the middle- it became so melancholy and talky I can’t even really remember what happened. But by the time Max was sailing back home and Carol was weeping and running down the beach like Bo Derek, I was trying incredibly hard not to cry. And while I left the theater wondering what it was I had just witnessed, ultimately I decided that if a piece of art can affect one in such a raw, emotional way, it must be doing something right.

This film’s going to have a lot of haters, from critics, to film students to the general public. But I’ll stand by it. It’s not perfect, far from it, really… but it’s beautiful, and that’s a rare thing to find in movies these days.

SCORE: 8.3

Should I Do a “LOST” Countdown?

Hey, guess what? I’m doing a poll!! That’s right, my very first poll- you, my avid readers, can decide the future of my blog. As many of you know, LOST is one of my favorite TV shows of all time, and as the final season is fast approaching, I thought it would be appropriate to write about the series here on my blog. But what I want to do- re-watch the entire series in order and write tiny capsule reviews of each episode- well, that’s a lot of work, and I’m also not so sure anyone would read it. So vote! And I’ll write!! Or not write…

Fall TV Roundup

The air is cooling, the leaves are changing, and considering how cold and fucking rainy it was today, I’d say fall has officially arrived. And that means new TV!!! As I want to be a TV writer, I obviously watch too much a lot of it, so here’s some recaps of what I’m watching right now.

Glee

Glee has been a mixed bag for me. Like many things that are over-hyped, I was convinced I would hate this show when it was being promoted late in the summer. But Alison liked the pilot, so I decided to get on board and for the first three eps or so I was hooked. It was a funny, compelling and heartfelt depiction of high school. But it almost seems now that because the show has been so critically lauded and been so successful in the ratings department, that the writers just aren’t trying anymore. Alison noted that they probably didn’t write the pilot with a game plan in mind- hell, I doubt if the creators even thought it would get made in the first place. But that’s no excuse for poor character development.

The fall season premiere (Ep. 102) was great- I didn’t feel confused even though I hadn’t seen the pilot, it introduced you to all the characters and set up all the different relationships while still being hilarious, and had the best musical performance to date, for Salt N Pepa’s “Push It.” But I found myself rolling my eyes at last week’s episode, “Vitamin D.” The drug subplot was funny, albeit kinda creepy, but I found myself struggling to find characters that I still related to. What was bugging me is that with the exception of Will, Emma and Finn, all of the characters are completely detestable. It’s annoying that Rachel is depicted as a heroine, a dopey underdog dork who just wants to be a superstar, because she’s kind of a bitch. Nearly everything she does is in service to herself, and her constant bickering with Will is frustrating. Terri is awful… I wish she’d spontaneously combust like she did on Heroes. Quinn, the obligatory cheerleader, doesn’t know whether to be a good person or a manipulative sociopath, and neither it seems, do the writers. Sue is the only character intentionally depicted as soulless, and is also the best on the show. She’s so over the top in her nastiness that she’s a constant source of comedy, and yet is criminally underused.

Last night’s episode, “Throwdown” was a welcome return to form after “Vitamin D,” and did what the show does best: create a nice, warm gumbo of drama and comedy- a dramedy stew, if you will. It also focused on the rivalry between Sue and Will, the best aspect of the show. But I still have one qualm: too many musical sequences, and too many pop song renditions. I have no problem with 2-3 songs, it is a show about a glee club after all, but last night there were like, five!! Alison and I actually fast-forwarded through the last one it was so superfluous. What’s questionable is that the show is doing more and more dream sequence songs, where people just break into song and then it cuts to a musical number in the football field or something. That makes the series a little too similar to High School Musical in my opinion, and is all around unnecessary. It’s probably the network’s fault- Glee’s next-day iTunes downloads are so successful, that they probably want to pump episodes with as many songs as possible, to gain more revenue. But if you think about it, you’re not really getting your bang for your buck. If there’s 10-15 minutes of runtime devoted to musical numbers, that means you’re getting 33% less TV show. It must be sweet to be a writer on Glee- your scripts only have to be thirty or forty pages but you get the same pay check as everyone else. It wouldn’t bother me so much if we were getting more “Don’t Stop Believin’”s and “Push It”s, but c’mon… Jordin Sparks? Really?

I suppose I am watching a show aimed at teens. Fuck. That makes me feel like a dork.

Fringe

While Fringe is losing viewers like GM is losing customers thanks to Fox’s idiotic decision to pit it against NBC’s comedy block and Grey’s Anatomy, it’s actually been getting better. Maybe it’s because Orci & Kurtzman have more or less left the show to work on the Star Trek sequel, or maybe it’s because it’s slowly starting to focus on its alternate reality mythos. The premiere was excellent- really good move saving the Leonard Nimoy exposition download for episode 4; keeping the first episode taut, tense and action-packed set a nice tone for the season. And Olivia materializing and rocketing out of her car window was priceless. The show still sort of feels like The X-Files with better production value and crappier actors, but hey, LOST doesn’t come back on till January and what other hardcore sci-fi show can you think of that’s on right now and is any good (and don’t you dare say Stargate: Universe)? I’m glad Broyles is becoming more of a regular character because Lance Reddick is awesome and without a doubt the best actor on the show.

It’s still amazing to me how J.J. Abrams continues to rip off my pilot script. In my script Earth is threatened by a genocidal society of humans from an alternate dimension bent on conquering us. In Fringe Earth is threatened by a genocidal society of humans from an alternate reality bent on destroying us. In the second episode of my series, an adept agent is sent from the alternate dimension to track down the protagonist. In Fringe a shape-shifting agent (turns out to be an android) is sent to track down the protagonist. In the outline for my series, it is revealed that the alternate dimension collided with another parallel universe and caused it to become a horrific wasteland. In Fringe William Bell’s (Leonard Nimoy) greatest fear is that the two universes will collide and only one will survive. Is my cat a spy or something, or is this just a bizarre and infuriating coincidence?

FlashForward

FlashForward seems to be turning into a love it or hate it kind of show- while it’s garnered pretty good reviews and ratings, many criticize it for being too similar to LOST, or just being too illogical to begin with. It’s true, it does share many similarities to ABC’s other epic sci-fi series, but after watching the first three episodes I can safely say it’s got it’s own unique thing going on. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if much of the crossover between the two series isn’t a product of the network, pushing the writers to make the show as close to LOST as possible without being obnoxious.

The pilot opens in much the same way as LOST’s: main character Joseph Fiennes wakes up in the middle of a horrific highway pile-up, before the show flashes back to earlier that morning, introducing you to all the principals before the inevitable “blackout” hits and all hell breaks loose. It also shares several actors, including Fiennes’ wife, played by Sonya Walger, who previously starred on LOST as Desmond’s GF Penny. Dominic Monaghan is going to show up somewhere down the line as a genius who may hold the key to the secret of the blackout, and even Sawyer’s baby momma shows up in a guest role. To put it bluntly: they’re not trying very hard to distance themselves from LOST.

But it’s okay, because the show has the same level of cinematic quality, is thoroughly entertaining, occasionally creepy, and persistently philosophical. Are our futures written or can we change our fates? It’s like LOST’s fifth season stretched out into an entire show, and you know, without any hydrogen bombs (hopefully). Where the show will go after the first season is something I often ponder while watching it. The season finale date is written into the plot: April 29th, 2010, the day all the characters experience in their flashforwards, and the producers promise that what caused the blackout will also be revealed by the first season’s conclusion. And then what? I imagine a seedy corporation or new world order will be revealed to be behind the whole thing, and the second season will involve uncovering them and bringing them to justice. It certainly seems that way, especially now that we’ve seen that disturbing monolith in Somalia that causes birds’ heads to explode.

The only thing that bugs me is that Shakespeare- excuse me- Joseph Fiennes keeps arranging his evidence board exactly as he saw it in his flashforward, even though he insists he doesn’t want the future to happen. Well then maybe you should, you know, try mixing that board up a bit. I guess he did burn the friendship bracelet, but in general the characters don’t seem to do things with their futures in mind. Still… great premise.

Dollhouse

Dollhouse continues to be the most intelligent and philosophical “popcorn” show (did I just coin that?) on television, and I hope it delivers on some of its larger mythology before it is inevitably cancelled. Perhaps there will be a miracle and Christ will be resurrected to save the show or something, but after the second season’s 13 episodes air Dollhouse will most likely join Firefly in the Hall of Joss Whedon Shows That Were Too Intelligent For The Fox Network. But until then, I’m gonna keep having a good time watching it.

Dollhouse certainly isn’t Whedon’s best show, but compared to most of the horseshit that’s on TV, it’s pretty badass. The season premiere was awesome, although the follow-up suffered from what I like to call “Second Episode-Itis,” a disease that afflicts most American one-hour dramas. Ep. 202, “Vows” featured an awesome cameo by BSG vet Jamie Bamber as a gangster (using his own British accent!), who far outshadowed another Galatica co-star who appeared on Dollhouse last week, Canadian pirate Michael Hogan. It was a good self-contained story that brought some logic to Ballard’s new allegiance to the Dollhouse, substantially developed most of the characters, and had some kickass fighting too. What really stood out was the interaction between Topher and Whiskey. Amy Acker delivered an incredible performance, and had some of the show’s most poignant and philosophical dialogue to date. The scene where she tries to sleep with Topher because she considers him to be her creator, then breaks down and questions her own existence, was beautiful.

While the serial killer-themed third ep was good too, I worry that Fox is pushing Whedon to deliver a much more episodic experience than I think he intended. I don’t know about other fans, but I’d much rather have them delve into some of the show’s deeper mythology, much of which was introduced in the unaired 13th episode from Season One, “Epitaph One.” What is the Dollhouse’s secret plan? Where’s Alpha? What are the implications of the House’s ability to essentially bestow clients with immortality? And will Echo ever become Caroline for real, or will Eliza Dushku be forced to act like a retard and dress in sexy outfits week in, week out? I mean, it’s not like there’s any chance of this show gaining any new viewers, no matter what Fox execs may think. This isn’t Law & Order: Dolls, it’s only half episodic. They should really deliver what the fans want, and insure future DVD purchases.

Dexter

Dexter is back in fine form, and each of Season Four’s first three episodes have been thoroughly entertaining. It’s still not entirely clear whether or not the show will be able to regain the glory it attained in its Season One & Two heyday, but it’s certainly better that that fucking Jimmy Smitts debacle. While Dexter’s relationship with Rita continues to steamroll forward, the show itself seems to be returning to its roots: fucking creepy serial killers. John Lithgow is amazing, and his scalding hot shower scene has already become infamous among fans I know and am friends with. Although it’s looking like his killer has your run-of-the-mill mommy issues, he’s still terrifying, especially as he forced his last victim to commit suicide. That’s fucked up.

I used to find Deborah charming in a goofy kind of way, but I’m losing more and more interest in her with each episode. I think she’s taking the whole Lundy thing too seriously, and while I know he did bone her, I’d prefer if his storyline was kept a little separate from hers. He’s a great character, one of the show’s better ones, and I liked his speech about being a “lone wolf.” That’s the kind of Lundy story I want to see.

If there’s one thing that doesn’t feel right to me, it’s the random love affair between LaGuerta and Angel. Fucking came out of left field. There’s never really been any semblance of romantic connection between the two in the last three seasons, so why’d they decide to shack up now? I don’t know, something about those two actors- I just don’t feel any chemistry.

Mad Men

Mad Men continues to deliver above-average television that is more intellectual than anything else on the boob tube, but I have found this season to be a little frustrating, and frankly, poorly structured. Individual episodes continue to be stellar, but I fear the series will never be able to recreate the majesty that was its first season. The problem isn’t the acting or the dialogue, it’s the fact that there is no through-line, no central plot to tie everything together. Storylines come and go like the wind; often moments that seemed important end up having no consequence. Character development is consistent, but some of the show’s best characters have stepped into the shadows, namely Peggy. Where the frak is Peggy?!! And whatever happened to her telling Pete that he was the father of her child? That was it? Never going to come up again?

I loved the Brits, especially Jared Harris, who played villain David Robert Jones on Fringe. But they sort of just stopped factoring into the plot entirely. After that guy got his foot chopped off (which I must say, was incredible- that was one of the most shocking moments ever in television, and that episode is one of the series’ best) they just stopped mattering. That’s probably because this whole Conrad Hilton dealie sort of enslaved the show, and in my opinion brought it down. Maybe it’s just because I hate Conrad Hilton so much, but I found the plot to be lame, especially the “Don needs a daddy figure” aspect. C’mon, Matthew Weiner, you’re more clever than that. And just like everything else on this season, nothing came of it. Don got to go to Italy and bang Betty, who continues to spiral into awfulness, then disappointed Hilton because he didn’t deliver the fucking moon. Here’s hoping JFK’s assassination sparks things up a bit.

Alex’s Upcoming TV Shows of Interest

The fall TV season has returned, and with it, a slew of exciting new shows, and some old favorites. I’m very selective about what TV I watch, mostly because it is full of such shit, so believe me, that there’s at least one thing in here you’d probably enjoy (if you have taste. If not watch Accidentally on Purpose).

First a review for a new show I didn’t think I’d be watching:

Glee

FOX, Wednesdays at 9 P.M. Season One.

Despite all the critical praise this series received after it’s backdoor pilot premiered following the American Idol finale (neither of which I watched), I never really got interested. I’ll be honest- I usually fucking hate musicals. The only ones I like are either animated, or are West Side Story. Sweeney Todd was cool, I guess. Anyway, it didn’t really look like something I’d like, and Alison, who wanted to watch it, agreed. “It’s happy, and silly and a musical. You probably wouldn’t like it,” she told me. But I had nothing better to do (usually don’t) so I watched the second premiere and was pleasantly surprised. The songs were pretty good, and the show was genuinely funny. Jane Lynch, who plays cheerleading coach Sue Sylvester really steals the show, and has all the funniest lines. What’s great is that there are classic stock high school characters, but many of them don’t really fit the archetype, or are an amalgamation of various ones. Sue, for instance, acts like your classic ex-military football coach, and the football coach, Ken, is an insecure dork. My only qualm is that there is maybe too many songs, which seems to be a ploy by FOX to make bank off next-day iTunes singles releases. They’re usually good, but sometimes are completely irrelevant, and thus, not as interesting to watch.

Fringe- 09.17.2009

FOX, Thursdays at 9 P.M. Season Two.

Ah, Fringe. The bastard child of LOST and The X-Files, Fringe’s first season was always entertaining, but rarely stellar. It didn’t really pick up until it revealed that it had stolen my idea for a pilot- ahem- excuse me- revealed that the “Pattern” of bizarre events was directly related to the murderous denizens of an alternate reality. For the record, my show actually involves a parallel universe, not an alternate reality, and is a 100x better. Anyway, the good: crazy sci-fi shit and monsters, a neat mythology, a very cinematic feel. The bad: Joshua Jackson, cliched dialogue and the show’s continued insistence that what it depicts is based on “science,” when it’s so clearly not, and the inane and irrelevant techno-babble that mad scientist Walter Bishop (John Noble) constantly sputters at the other characters. Not to mention that the show actually has far too few characters. There’s really only three main cast members, and a grab-bag of thinly developed supporting characters who are often far better actors than the mains, and are more interesting despite usually having only one trait that defines them.

But the cliffhanger finale kind of blew me away, and as LOST is still on hiatus and Battlestar’s over, I really have nothing better to do. The finale got my hopes up that the show would become more serialized and stop having random episodes that revolve around a giant cold virus, or a chimera Walter made when he was drunk one day, and stick to the alternate reality mythos. The producers assured fans at Comic-Con that this would be the case, but every trailer, preview and piece of promotional material I have laid eyes on suggests otherwise. “New cases, endless possibilities.” How about “new cases, more repetitiveness.” Tonight’s season premiere will hopefully give us an idea of what direction the series will be taking this year.

Community- 09.17.2009

NBC, Thursdays at 9:30 P.M. until October 8th, then Thursdays at 8 P.M. Series Premiere.

Although I’m kind of tired of dry, docu-style comedies like The Office and 30 Rock, they’re still a hell of a lot better than sitcoms (looking at you again Accidentally On Purpose. Seriously, can that show go fuck itself?). And this one stars Chevy Chase and Joe McHale (you know… the guy from Talk Soup). Probably won’t be as funny as 30 Rock, but it’s worth a look. What I find extra funny is that Chase plays a student, not a teacher as I previously thought. Now that’s a recipe for comedy.

FlashForward- 09.24.2009

ABC, Thursdays at 8:00 P.M. Series Premiere.

Probably the most talked about new drama this year, and certainly the one I’m most excited to see. I’ll admit, it seems heavily influenced by LOST- hell, it even stars two of the actors from that show: Sonya Walger (Penny) and Dominic Monaghan (Charlie). But the premise is rock solid, a tale of everyday people struggling to cope in the aftermath of a cataclysmic event, one in which every human being on the planet has a vision of six months in the future. What’s cool is that the date everyone flashes to- April 29th, 2010- will be reached by the end of the first season. Also stars Shakespeare and Harold Lee.

Dollhouse- 09.25.2009

FOX, Fridays at 9 P.M. Season Two.

I have mixed emotions about Dollhouse. While Firefly is one of my favorite shows of all time, and it’s always nice to see Joss Whedon get work, I wasn’t all that intrigued by the show when it first came out. It was until my Whedon-obsessive friend Sarith told me it was awesome that I decided to check it out. While campy and/or goofy about 68% of the time, the show does incite a lot of questions about the nature of identity and free will, and there were some truly amazing episodes in the first season. But it ended on a pretty weak and anti-climactic note, with Echo continuing to work as a brainwashed Doll, the more funny than scary Alpha still on the run, and Ballard (Helo from Battlestar) working for the very people he swore to bring down, for no real reason. Not a great set-up for the second season, but an appearance by BSG alum Jamie Bamber (Lee Adama) and Firefly vet/Terminator Summer Glau are sure to be good. I was just hoping that Echo would figure out what was up by season’s end and that the show would become more serialized in subsequent seasons- this doesn’t appear to be the case, which is a bummer.

30 Rock- 10.15.2009

NBC, Thursdays at 9:30 P.M. Season Four.

I want to go to there.

Caprica- 01.29.2010

SyFy, Fridays. Season One.

Caprica is kind of like Battlestar Galactica’s ugly, retarded half-brother. It tries really hard and has a good heart, but it’ll never be able to amount to the kind of glory its kin has. It’s also a little too weird and trippy for its own good. But hey, there’s Cylons and Matrix-esque ruminations on the meaning of life, and baby Will Adama. Give it a chance, okay?

LOST- January 2010

ABC, Wednesdays. Season Six.

THE FINAL SEASON. What an epic marketing tagline. And what an epic series. It’ll be sad to see my favorite show come to a close, but I’m eager to see how they wrap it all up. I await January with nervous anticipation. What if they fuck it all up? Seems unlikely considering how great the show has been so far, but what if they decide to go all Fringe on us and reveal that the Incident actually created an alternate reality where everything’s peachy? How stupid would that be? But I think we can expect less focus on the sci-fi and DHARMAville aspects of LOST, and look for a season that delves into the ancient origins of the Island, and the nature of the conflict between the guy who may actually be Jesus, a.k.a. Jacob, and his black-clad, potentially shapeshifting nemesis. I can’t wait.

Day One- March 2010

NBC. Series Premiere.

Considering NBC’s track record as of late (did you see the last season of Heroes?), this will probably be a steaming pile of alien shit. But I give them props for trying. For starters, I think the idea of creating a self-contained, 13 episode series that runs consecutively and doesn’t necessarily have to be renewed after it ends, is great. And it’s about an alien invasion, has lots of explosions and is all post-apocalyptic and shit. I love post apocalypses. It’s certainly going to be better than ABC’s V remake, which trust me (i’ve seen it), sucks a lot.

Burn Notice- 2010

USA. Season Three, Part 2.

Now that I’m given up on Heroes, and banished its memory to the furthest reaches of my subconscious, I’d say this is probably my “guilty pleasure show.” It’s not dumb- quite the contrary. The spy lingo and technobabble seems very authentic and heavily researched, and every line that comes out of Bruce Campbell’s mouth is hilarious. He’s probably the reason I keep coming back week after week. The story isn’t particularly compelling, nor is it ever going to go anywhere. And Jeffrey Donovan is criminally underused. He’s an amazing actor- you have to watch USA’s old serial killer drama Touching Evil to understand, because his character on Burn Notice, Michael Westen is a spy, and naturally reserved. He never opens up emotionally, so all we ever see of him is various made-up personalities that he uses to manipulate marks. Kind of like Echo on Dollhouse, actually…

Xbox 360 Releases- August-September

So, it’s been a while since I last posted on this thing, but I’m back with a vengeance… a little late on some of this stuff, but I promise I got some goodies coming up, including a poll. Wow!! A poll!!

Batman: Arkham Asylum

Why you little!!!

XBOX 360, Rated T for Teen

So, this is almost a month late, but considering this has been practically the only game I’ve been playing lately, and since I’ve become obsessed with getting all the Achievements for it, figured I should give it a review.

Licensed video games are a sordid affair. By that, I mean that 99.9% of the time they suck balls. In my experience the only ones that are worthwhile brandish either the Star Wars or Lord of the Rings moniker, and even those are pretty hit or miss. So I wasn’t all that excited for Batman: Arkham Asylum, despite my love for the character. The Caped Crusader is without a doubt, the greatest super hero of all time, and Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight is one of my favorite movies. But in previews and magazine articles, Arkham Asylum just looked weak. A Batman beat ‘em up game? Seems a little obvious. And while it was fun, even the preview I played at Comic-Con failed to impress. It wasn’t until the demo was released on Xbox Live that I knew this was a must-have.

The game does a great job of balancing the styles of the comics, the original animated series, and Nolan’s two “realistic” Batman films. The character designs seem like they came from a Grant Morrison-era graphic novel, most of the voices were provided by the cast of The Animated Series, including Kevin Conroy as Batman and Mark Hamill as the Joker, and the music sounds very Hans Zimmer-esque. Arkham Asylum excels for many reasons, but chiefly I think it’s a great game because it isn’t connected to any other Batman media- it’s an entirely standalone experience, complete with an original story that rivals any Batman tale you’ve read or seen before. Above all, it allows you to fill the role of Batman like never before. I had only ever played one Batman game prior to this- 2001’s Batman Vengeance for the Gamecube, which was based on The New Batman Adventures, the follow-up to The Animated Series. It was decent, and while more cartoony, it still had a pretty dark story that began with the Joker faking his own death. But it fell short on almost all accounts, and you never really felt like you were the Dark Knight.

Arkham Asylum puts you in his shoes, and everything from how he glides with his cape, grapples, and fights multiple enemies at once, is spot on. There’s also a host of gadgets, most of which are used in stealth sequences, which I found to be the most enjoyable part of the game. The “freeflow” combat as they call it, is probably more addictive though, and it’s a very eloquent fighting system. Batman really only has a couple moves, and only one “attack” button, but the game rewards you for stringing together multiple moves and constantly blocking enemy attacks. An instant takedown move allows you to break enemies’ limbs, and there’s also the option to toss them across the room like ragdolls. It’s all very kickass, and the game has a ton of re-playability. Like I said, I’ve been playing this almost non-stop since August 25th, and god knows how many hours I’ve put in. Too many I imagine.

So far the biggest surprise in gaming for me. This is well worth $59.99, and will be a treat for Batman, fighting, stealth, and action fans alike. Buy it. NOW.

SCORE: 9.8

F.E.A.R. 2: Reborn DLC

XBOX 360, Rated M for Mature. Available via download from Xbox Live.

Released at the beginning of September, Reborn is a five-mission expansion to F.E.A.R. 2: Project Origin, downloadable via Xbox Live and assumedly, PSN. In case you didn’t know, F.E.A.R. is a series of highly successful FPS/survival horror hybrids- think The Ring plus The Matrix, because slowmo is a big part of the game. Reborn puts you in the shoes of what is usually the primary enemy in the game- a “Replicant” (basically a clone soldier) called Foxtrot 813. F.E.A.R. 2 was essentially F.E.A.R. 1 with better graphics and more gore, so I wasn’t exactly frothing at the mouth for Reborn. But for approximately $9.99 (800 Microsoft Points) it’s totally worth it, at least if you’re into the series. Nothing that new, and Foxtrot 813 plays exactly the same as every other character in F.E.A.R., but it’s nice to get into that powered armor one more time and blow security guards into little red globules.

SCORE: 7.2

Star Wars The Force Unleashed: Tatooine DLC

XBOX 360, Rated T for Teen. Available via download from Xbox Live.

The second of three bonus missions for the latest Star Wars console outing, this DLC is set in an alternate universe where Vader’s apprentice and the game’s protagonist, Starkiller has killed him (one of the possible endings of the original game) and has taken his place as Emperor Palpatine’s servant. Palpatine sends him to Tatooine to hunt down C-3PO and R2-D2 after their escape at the beginning of A New Hope, which pitches the player into encounters with iconic characters like Jabba the Hutt and his Rancor, Boba Fett, and ultimately, Obi-Wan Kenobi himself. Also priced at 800 MP, this felt like a much better deal than Reborn, even though it probably provides you with even fewer hours of gameplay. It’s just a really good idea, and is executed very nicely. All your favorite Tatooine moments are represented, even Jabba’s droid torture room. While it is slightly disturbing to be the evil, twisted bad guy, it was still satisfying to annihilate Boba Fett, Obi-Wan, and Obi-Wan’s spirit. “More powerful than you could ever imagine” my ass.

SCORE: 8.1

I do have a complaint, but it’s unrelated to the DLC. Being the stingy bastard that he is, George Lucas and Lucasarts have decided to make the third bonus mission, which takes place on Hoth and allows you to fight and kill Luke Skywalker once and for all, available exclusively on the upcoming rerelease of the game, called the Ultimate Sith Edition. Well you know what? I already own the fucking game, man. And I want to play the Hoth mission. But I’m not about to sell my copy back at a tenth of the price and then shell out $39.99 to play one extra fucking mission. So fuck you.

WET Demo

XBOX 360. Single Player demo, available for download via Xbox Live.

I wasn’t that interested in this game until I started watching some behind the scenes videos on IGN and learned a few important facts:

1) This is billed as a grindhouse-styled third person actioner. Basically, if Quentin Tarantino made a videogame, this would be it.
2) Eliza Dushku voices the main character, a badass sword-swinging, gun-toting chick named Rubi.
3) There’s lots of slow motion.

Once I understood these facts I got excited. And I was even more excited when I found the demo on Xbox Live one lonely, drunken night. Unfortunately, the demo did not meet any of my expectations, and was a bit of letdown. I’m not ruling this one out completely yet- I’ll wait to see what the critics say before I make my decision. But the demo was pretty lackluster. For starters, I’m fucking sick of slowmo. Why does EVERY game feel it needs to employ some kind of slowmo feature? Max Payne came out eight years ago, people, let’s try something different. It wouldn’t be that big a deal if it was used well, but in WET it seemed kind of arbitrary. It doesn’t really add anything to the gameplay, it just makes it look cooler and makes it easier to blow away dumbass AI enemies who, by the way, can take about a dozen rounds to the head, neck and chest, before going down.

Trailers and previews for the game make it seem like there’s almost too many moves for Rubi to do, and granted, I only played a fraction (I hope) of the full game. But even after a few minutes I felt like it was getting redundant. You pretty much either slide on your knees, leap through the air, or wall-run while blasting your guns, and if you get too close, you press X and automatically kill a baddie with an unblockable sword swing. There’s other acrobatic moves- swinging on poles, sliding down ladders- but none seemed particularly useful. Not to mention that the swordplay seems like an afterthought- all you do is press one button, and that’s it. Not much variety there.

Two aspects of the game I was really looking forward to also failed to impress. First, there’s the “bloodlust” mode, which is activated when Rubi gets an enemy’s blood all over her face. The world changes to a stylized red, black and white, much like a graphic novel, and Rubi is rendered virtually invincible. While it looks cool, it’s more or less pointless. It makes what seems like a pretty easy game even easier. Then there’s the much talked-about car chase sequence, what should be the coup de grace for the game. It’s cool and well choreographed- definitely the highlight of the demo. But it was just as overly simple as the rest of the package. All you do is blast infinitely respawnable baddies as they drive around you in sedans, then press a button when a prompt is given to you on screen, which activates a cut scene where Rubi does something badass. Only it’s the computer doing it, not you, so it kind of takes all the fun out of it.

I’ll have to see what critics like IGN and Game Informer say when WET hits shelves this Tuesday, but it’s looking like I might save myself six Hamiltons and take a pass on this one. The question is though, whether or not I want to buy this monstrosity:

I was sort of morally opposed to ODST, simply because it felt like an overpriced expansion pack. I was also kind of sick of Halo. But the more I read about it, coupled with Microsoft’s always ingenious marketing campaign (can someone make a Halo movie? Pleeaaase?), the more I became intrigued. I’m interested mainly because you are no longer playing as Master Chief, who’s so powerful he’s kind of like a superhero. Now you’re just a regular dude, which means this will probably be a more intense experience, and more akin to other FPS’s. When MC takes on a Brute, it’s no problem, because he’s seven feet tall. When a drop trooper encounters one… well… imagine facing a nasty, eight foot-tall monster with a gun that shoots needles. Yeah. That’s what I thought.

Wave Goodbye- My “Final” Nine Inch Nails Show

If you know me, then you know that my favorite band is Nine Inch Nails. In fact, I am straight up obsessed with them, hence the category this post is being filed under. Thus, last Sunday’s performance at Webster Hall, one of the final shows in the Wave Goodbye tour, which Trent Reznor claims will be the band’s last, was incredibly important to me.

I have only been listening to NIN since 2004, when I picked up The Downward Spiral via my mom’s company account with BMG music, which allowed us (for a time) to purchase select CDs for $5. It was awesome, and my CD-purchasing (or just music purchasing in general) has diminished ever since the service was pulled. I had been aware of the band since somewhere around 1998, and was familiar with mega-hits “Closer” and “Hurt,” and was re-familiarized with the latter when Johnny Cash released his even more popular cover in 2003. Sometimes, the manner in which I become interested in a piece of art or pop culture is strange and intricate, like an intertwining network of vines. In the winter of 2003, after I had once again been made aware of the band through Cash, I saw the trailer for the newest installment in my then reigning obsession: Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings adaptation. The theatrical trailer for The Two Towers featured a classic musical montage, set to a more epic version of Clint Mansell’s theme song for Requiem for a Dream. I watched the trailer over and over, and became quite fond of the song. My friend Tim, an audiophile and at the time, NIN fan, told me that the tune was actually a variation of NIN’s instrumental, “The Frail.” So I downloaded it, and liked it, although I wasn’t so sure Tim was right.

Today, I know much more background on the band, and the Requiem song, and I can safely say that it was definitely influenced by “The Frail.” They aren’t the exact same song, but Clint Mansell, the composer for Requiem, actually worked as an engineer on The Fragile, and was one of Reznor’s many protégés. The version of “The Frail” featured on the 2000 remix album Things Falling Apart replaced the soft piano chords with strings, provided by the world-famous Kronos Quartet, who also performed the score for Requiem. In that version, one can definitely hear the resemblance.

I’m drifting, I know. Half of you have probably stopped reading already. “Get to the concert review!!” you’re saying. “This guy’s a massive dork, look how much useless trivia he knows about Nine Inch Nails!!” It’s true, I know a lot. And I’m sorry if I’m taking my time, but I think it’s imperative you understand how important this band is to me. It may seem silly to some, but Reznor’s music really has touched me, and has fundamentally changed my life. It continues to today, and Sunday’s show was sort of the culmination of all that. If you’re a music lover like I am, then you understand what I’m talking about. We all have that one band, or that one song, that just speaks to us. We don’t really know why, we might even be embarrassed by it, but it’s there. It’s real. And nothing can change it.

“The Frail” was not my true introduction to Nine Inch Nails. Just as my initiation into the world of jazz was precipitated by a videogame, Grim Fandango, my intro to NIN was spurred on by a television show, one I have mentioned before on this blog, and one that no one’s ever heard of: Touching Evil. The show premiered in March 2004, right after I returned from spring break in Spain, and starred a host of talented but then unknown actors: Jeffrey Donovan, now famous for his portrayal of super-spy Michael Westen on Burn Notice, Vera Farmiga, Kevin Durand, Zach Grenier and even Bradley Cooper. The premise of the show was a little silly: a former federal agent who’s lost all inhibitions due to a non-fatal gunshot to the head returns to help run a new division he co-founded designed to hunt down serial killers, but trust me- it was amazing.

The two-hour pilot featured Nine Inch Nail’s “A Warm Place,” which was previously used in Oliver Stone’s Natural Born Killers, and the low-fi version of “The Day the World Went Away” found on the companion disc to the band’s 2002 live album, called Still. It was also scored by Atticus Ross, a frequent NIN collaborator, who has helped mix and engineer practically all of their albums. I loved both songs and quickly downloaded them with Limewire or whatever pre-torrent program I was using back then. The Still version of TDTWWA was almost impossible to find, and I ended up with the album version, which was confusing, as it was drastically different- much louder and heavier, but the more I listened to it the more it grew on me. Eventually I decided maybe an album would be worth a listen- I had already started dipping my feet in rock music, having previously become a big fan of Pink Floyd and Radiohead. So I ordered The Downward Spiral and sat down for a listen.

At first I didn’t really like it. There was definitely songs that stuck out to me as good: “Piggy,” “Closer,” “Hurt.” But I had never heard anything quite that loud, dissonant, or jarring before. And my natural human reaction was: ugh. This is too loud. Where is the pleasant ambient music I thought I would get after watching Touching Evil? But as it was one of the few CDs I owned at the time that wasn’t jazz, I ended up listening to it constantly during my time at the New York Film Academy’s Universal Studios program in Los Angeles, and it quickly grew on me until, within mere months of first popping it into my stereo, I was obsessed. I listened to it constantly, and still have fond memories of smoking on the roof of my Burbank hotel complex, rocking out to “Ruiner” while watching wildfires burn atop the faraway hills.

I soon felt an almost addictive need for more Nine Inch Nails. So naturally I grabbed their second-most famous album, the double-disc epic The Fragile, and quickly ate it up. It took a little more time to grow on me- it was longer, and thus has more weak tracks, although I already enjoyed some songs more than those on TDS (namely “The Day the World Went Away,” “We’re In This Together” and “The Fragile.” Today, it is my favorite entry in the NIN catalogue, and the first disc is probably my most beloved piece of music ever produced. Even in July 2004 the music was inspiring me- while filming my spaghetti western I was working on a script inspired by NIN songs and structured around cues I planned to cull from TDS and The Fragile. The script has sadly been lost ever since my high school-issued Dell laptop went kaput, and it never got made, as my friends were a bunch of deadbeats and weren’t interested in helping me produce it. In the long run, it worked out: the script eventually evolved into my 28-page Intro to Dramatic and Visual Writing II project entitled Amnesiac, but as I went to Dublin and took music video production instead of Color Sync, it too never got produced. But the idea stuck with me, and it transformed into both my Advanced Television Production screenplay, called Portal (which did get produced), and an expanded one hour TV pilot of the same name. Funny how much impact a couple rock songs can have on one’s life.

I became a Nine Inch Nails fan at the perfect moment. One year after I started listening to them Trent Reznor released his newest opus, With Teeth and went on tour. In 2005 I attended my first concert, a massive show at Madison Square Garden with Queens of the Stone Age and Death From Above 1979. I have seen the band six times since then, and every time they have put on a superior show, but I’ll always have a soft spot for that first time, especially as I had just gotten into QOTSA the summer before. Reznor’s gotten very bad at picking opening acts as of late. The next show I saw had Saul Williams which was awesome. The next had Peaches, which was fun in a guilty pleasure sort of way, followed by Bauhaus, which should have been awesome except that they sounded sludgy and dissonant. Next was Does It Offend You, Yeah? which I don’t feel I need to elaborate on, and the last three shows, including the Webster Hall outing, featured the worst openers: HEALTH, Street Sweeper Social Club and The Horrors. Some of my friends like HEALTH and assure me they’re awesome, but in addition to looking like a bunch of hoodie-wearing hipsters cut out of Vibe magazine, they also put on an awful show and were almost booed off the stage. SSSC should have been cool, and they were anytime Tom Morello was doing a guitar solo, but the lead singer / rapper, Boots Riley was as terrible as his juvenile lyrics. The Horrors featured an equally douchebag-esque lead singer, who’s only capable of singing like Ian Curtis, and thus made the whole band sound like a lame rip-off of a lame-rip off of Joy Division.

But that didn’t stop the show from blowing me away. Before Reznor and co. took the stage I hadn’t exactly been in the best mood for moshing. But the second they opened with “Mr. Self Destruct” I couldn’t help myself. The rendition wasn’t quite as good as the one I had witnessed at the March 2006 show in Amherst (it’s a lot cooler when four guys are standing in a row at the front of the stage wailing on guitars), but it’s always a great opener. Next came “Piggy,” and a personal favorite of mine, “Heresy,” which is awesome live. Even when the band played the shorter, album version of “March of the Pigs” and segued right into “Closer,” I still didn’t realize what was happening. I was so overwhelmed with joy when they started “Ruiner” that it still did not occur to me. It wasn’t until “The Becoming” that it hit me: they’re playing the whole fucking album!!! And that’s when the show kind of stopped being just a concert, and transcended into a spiritual experience for me.

I wasn’t on drugs, wasn’t even drunk. But I felt high as shit. Sweat coated my body and kept getting in my eyes, but I didn’t care. The usually oppressive swell of the mosh pit now felt comforting, like I was somehow connecting with all the bald metalheads and fat chicks, like I was actually part of a community. People weren’t even moshing that much anymore- everyone was so amazed by what was happening that not even the crunching guitar riffs of “Big Man With a Gun” could get them all that riled up. We all knew we were experiencing a once in a lifetime event, something that was truly special, and would stay with us for the rest of our lives, and we knew we had to savor it.

As the band reached the quiet instrumental interlude “A Warm Place,” I found myself swaying back and forth, eyes closed, as if in ecstasy. Their music transported me to another place, a completely cerebral plane. When they finally reached the album-closer “Hurt,” people started shouting “Thank you, Trent!” I had always wanted to meet Reznor, mostly just to tell him how much his music had changed my life and because I get the feeling he’s a pretty cool guy. Tonight, I just wanted to shake his hand and say thanks for putting on such an amazing show.

After “Hurt” Trent announced that that was the first and last time the band had ever played The Downward Spiral in its entirety and in order. And if that wasn’t enough, they played another ten songs! I have to take a moment to give some props to the band’s guitarist, Robin Finck. He is fucking incredible. When I first saw NIN they had a different guitarist, Aaron North of the Icarus Line and co-founder of Buddyhead Records. He was great too, but nowhere near as awesome as Finck. Back in freshman year of college, my friend and fellow NIN-obsessive Bob Burdalski introduced me to the 2002 NIN concert DVD, And All That Could Have Been, and we both commented on how badass Finck was in it, and how we wished he was still with the band. So we were both overjoyed to hear that he was rejoining for the 2008 Lights in the Sky tour, and every subsequent show. He is amazing at the guitar. He has this great ability to take a really distinctive NIN guitar riff, and make his own, like the classic rock solo in “Ruiner.” And the things he does with feedback- astounding. Just a really, really, talented musician; he adds a whole nother level to the Nine Inch Nails live experience.

When the show was finally over I told my friend and companion Brian “that was definitely the best concert I’ve ever been too.” He wholeheartedly agreed. My ears rang for days and it took me nearly an entire week to conjure up the words to describe what I had experienced. It was the most fitting end to Nine Inch Nails I could have imagined, and I will never forget it, for as long as I live. Will this in fact be the end of NIN? I’m not so sure. Reznor himself has stated he plans to continue making music, and that he is merely tired of touring as a large band. Usually when a band declares their latest tour as their “farewell,” it’s total bullshit, but Reznor isn’t your average rock star, and is genuine enough to stick to his declarative statements. I could see him doing a more low-key sort of thing. Perhaps just him and Robin Finck, playing the band’s more quiet / instrumental songs. Either way, I’m excited to see what the man will do next.

SETLIST:

Mr. Self Destruct
Piggy
Heresy
March of the Pigs
Closer
Ruiner
The Becoming
I Do Not Want This
Big Man With a Gun
A Warm Place
Eraser
Reptile
The Downward Spiral
Hurt
1,000,000
Terrible Lie
Metal
Lights in the Sky
Burn
Gave Up
Suck
Physical (You’re So)
The Hand That Feeds
Head Like a Hole

One of the Weirdest Movies I’ve Ever Seen… -Inglourious Basterds Review

Wait... this bitch is the protagonist?

SPOILER ALERT

To start, I must admit I am one of Quentin Tarantino’s biggest fans. I’ve had an interest in filmmaking since I was little, but it wasn’t until I saw Pulp Fiction at age 14 that I knew I wanted to make movies. That film blew me away; I had no idea a film could be so clever, inventive and nuanced until I saw it. It is still, one of my favorites, if not my all-time favorite movie. So I’ll see anything the guy does. He could shoot a steaming turd for two hours and I’d shell out $12.50 to see it.

Until now, what I loved about Tarantino’s films was that you could spot them from a mile away. No one makes movies like he does, whether that’s a good thing or a bad thing I’m not so sure anymore. His films are all genre pieces, every one of them, each loosely based on some incredibly obscure piece of Grindhouse filmmaking that he adored as a jittery little kid. This is a good thing, as you know you’re going to get something different in each one… at least until now. He’s also fond of breaking his scripts up into chapter-like vignettes, and chopping up the continuity of events. These were stylistic choices I always loved, but as the ending credits for Inglourious Basterds started to roll last night, I felt like a) I had seen this all before, and b) Tarantino had just been fucking with me for two and a half hours. Straight-up fucking with me, while simultaneously jerking off all over the screen.

Maybe I’m just grouchy because the film was deceptively marketed. I should have known the previews weren’t actually giving me an idea of what the movie was like- the marketing team probably shit their pants when they saw this film. They marketed it like it’s a stylized World War II revenge action film, with Brad Pitt as the protagonist and big star. That is in no way what this movie is. For starters, Brad Pitt appears in approximately 30% of the film. The character who sees the most screen time is actually the villain, Col. Hans Landa, the “Jew Hunter,” played impeccably by Cristoph Waltz. That guy is an incredible actor, and pretty much stole the whole show. He is the consummate Nazi, and really made the film feel like a period piece (despite the David Bowie song cameos, and Samuel L. Jackson expository voiceovers). Even more prominent than Pitt’s hilarious Aldo Raine (that guy’s a great actor too) is Shosanna Dreyfus (Mélanie Laurent), the sole survivor of one of Landa’s Jew raids. While I kind of lost myself in her beautiful eyes, I found her subplot (or A-story, that’s the thing, I had no idea what was a subplot and what wasn’t) the least interesting, even though it’s kind of the crux of the whole story.

Now, don’t tell me that when you saw the trailer, you didn’t think this was going to be a straight actioner that followed Aldo the Apache and his Basterds as they wreaked havoc on the Nat-zis. I expected each of his eight Jew warriors to be unique and fully rounded characters, who we would get to know over the course of the film. Uh-uh. Aldo’s really the only one you ever get to know, in fact, besides him I can only remember six other guys, and only barely. And the only other one who’s name I remember is Donnie Donowitz, the “Bear Jew,” played by Tarantino’s pal Eli Roth. I was looking forward to seeing whether the guy could act, but unfortunately, I still don’t know, as he has about a dozen lines in the whole 152 minute affair. The most memorable thing he does is beat a guy to death with a bat and of course, shoot Hitler’s face off. Maybe I wouldn’t have minded so much if I wasn’t expecting the film to center around the Basterds, which it absolutely does not, but Pitt was doing such a great job I found myself wishing there was about 90% more of him.

This movie is completely bizarre. That’s the best way I can describe it. It breaks every single rule about screenwriting, story structure and character development ever established. It’s like Tarantino burned all his screenwriting books before he sat down to pen this. There really isn’t a central story, or a central protagonist. It’s really just a collection of impeccably-written (the dialogue is as sharp as ever) vignettes loosely tied together. I’ve never really seen anything like it. Even as I write this I can’t decide whether I liked it or not. It was definitely entertaining- Tarantino’s films always are -but it kind of felt like same old, same old to me. For starters, did we really need chapters? I guess we did… this film is vignette-based. But okay, there’s a question: do we really need another Tarantino movie with a compartmentalized structure? Why can’t he just try doing a straightforward cleanly-edited, movie? You know, try something different for once? The film also didn’t feature any original score, which really bothered me. The soundtrack was almost exclusively dominated by Ennio Morricone, which pissed me off. I kept thinking, “Alright dude, you did this already. You used spaghetti western music in Kill Bill. This isn’t a spaghetti western. It’s a war movie. Try something new… PLEASE.” And if he loves Ennio Morricone so much, why didn’t he just give the guy a call and ask him to score the film? He’s still alive for Chrissakes! To top it off, Tarantino used one of the exact same music cues he used in Kill Bill, which only helped to add to the sense that I was watching the same thing I had seen in all his other movies. Yes, it takes place during WWII. And the script is admittedly more scatterbrained than any of his previous works. But besides that, it’s kind of like Kill Bill, except the Bride is a blonde French Jew, Bill is an SS colonel, and the Crazy 88s are Nat-zis.

The film is also way too long. It was engrossing enough that I didn’t really notice that often, but there was this one scene… this one scene that was both one of the most brilliant things I’d ever seen, and one of the worst. We haven’t seen any of the Basterds in a while. We’re introduced to some random, smarmy British guy as he gets briefed by Mike Myers, who seemed kind of uncomfortable doing a (semi) serious movie. Finally we get to see Aldo again. But only for about one minute. Then British guy, one of the Basterds that was actually reasonably fleshed out, and another one, go to meet their undercover contact at a bar. The contact is a German actress played by Diane Kruger, who is featured in the movie for all of fifteen minutes. Unfortunately for the trio, the bar is currently home to a group of Nazis celebrating one of their members’ newborn babies. The Basterds (disguised in Nazi uniforms and speaking German) are approached by an SS colonel we met like, twenty minutes prior, and just once, who is clearly on to them. They talk for almost ten minutes straight before the guy finally figures out they’re not Nazis. Guns are pulled out, and in the blink of an eye everyone except the Nazi father and Diane Kruger are dead.

The scene is brilliant for a number of reasons. For starters, the dialogue is incredible. Second, it’s very tense. Third, Tarantino does a really good job of getting us to know this British guy after seeing him for only a few minutes, as well as the SS colonel. And the violence is brilliantly choreographed- it comes out of nowhere, it’s quick, bloody, brutal, and before you know it, it’s over. I wasn’t even sure at first who was dead and who wasn’t. But while I was watching the scene I felt my mind wander. “How many pages was this thing?” I thought. “They really didn’t feel the need to cut it down?” And I also couldn’t help but think, “Where’s Aldo? Why am I watching these people I barely know play charades? Can we please get back to Brad Pitt, or at least Cristoph Waltz?” That’s who I want to see. That’s who I paid to see. Not some British guy who comes and goes in the blink of an eye.

I gotta hand it to Tarantino though: I never know which of his characters are going to die. However, before it worked really well. Remember when John Travolta gets shot to death in Pulp Fiction? That was like, the most shocking movie moment ever. Even in Death Proof I felt my jaw drop when Kurt Russell wrecks those chicks. But here, while I enjoyed the visceral nature of the violence, when a character got offed, I merely muttered, “meh.” I didn’t know them well enough to care.

I’m probably going to have to see this again before I can formulate a response that’s actually somewhat cogent. For now, I feel like it’s both one of the best, and worst films of the year. Tarantino is still a great director, and his movies are generally miles above most of the shit at the multiplex. This film wasn’t bad… it was just bizarre, and for me, slightly disappointing. I wanted a kickass revenge flick, not a cerebral European film with occasional bursts of ridiculous violence. But overall, I found it satisfactory. I mean, seeing Hitler and Goebbels get gunned down- isn’t that one of the most cathartic images you can think of? But if I had to rate Tarantino’s films, this wouldn’t be at the top. In fact, I think it would go something like this:

1) Pulp Fiction
2) Kill Bill (Vol. 2 first, then Vol. 1, but I don’t really look at them as separate movies)
3) Reservoir Dogs
4) Inglourious Basterds
5) Death Proof
6) Jackie Brown

I don’t want Tarantino to change his style. I do want him to take more risks. And ultimately, I want him to make films that feel like they were made just as much for the audience’s pleasure, as for his own.

SCORE: 7.8

Avatar Day

In case you didn’t know, yesterday James Cameron and 20th Century FOX presented a select group of lucky fans with a 16 minute preview of Cameron’s upcoming film, Avatar. I was one of the lucky few who got to see the selected scenes, but before I discuss what I saw, I need to address the clusterfuck that is FOX’s marketing campaign.

Showing even more than 16 mins of footage in 3D at Comic-Con? Great marketing. Releasing the lackluster teaser trailer before Avatar Day? Foolish. I’ll explain why: unless viewed in IMAX 3D, this film will elicit nothing but a very quiet “meh.” Which is, I think, it’s biggest problem. Without the 3D, it’s just another CG-heavy sci-fi actioner, with very uninspired art direction and characters that look like they stepped out of a Disney cartoon. So, again, for FOX to create so much hype over the film’s “technology” was not a good move, as frankly, the technology is not that impressive, at least, not that impressive in 2D. This is without a doubt, the most extraordinary 3D and IMAX film ever made, and for that, I recommend you all go see it. But there is no revolution in CGI here. The Na’avi do have impressive motion-capture and facial animation, but it’s nothing you haven’t seen before. I went with my buddy Andrés, who made an interesting comment after the preview was done spooling: “this would have been so much cooler five years ago.” And he’s right. If this had been released before Pirates of the Caribbean’s Davy Jones, or even The Lord of the Rings‘ Gollum, it would have blown people’s minds. But I think what we ended up with was a satisfactory but somewhat underwhelming sci-fi movie, that is visually stunning, but only in IMAX, and probably not much else.

An even worse marketing mishap was Avatar Day itself. I refreshed avatarmovie.com at 3:00 P.M exactly on Monday, and when I clicked the “tickets” tab I was sent to a blank page that said “choose from one of the theaters below.” But there were no theaters to choose from. So I tried again. The page wouldn’t load. So I refreshed the homepage. It wouldn’t load either. The website had presumably crashed, and was down for the next hour and a half. Finally I managed to pull up the list of theaters, but could only get the link for Lincoln Square to load, which was okay, because it was the one I wanted to go to. I RSVPed once, the network timed out. I tried again, this time it worked. I was told I would get a confirmation e-mail shortly.

Two hours later and no confirmation e-mail. I panicked, decided, you know what? fuck it, and RSVPed for all three of the Manhattan theaters. The next day I received RSVPs for all three. The following day I received another e-mail informing me that due to the crash of the website, I would have to RSVP again, and may not get the theater I originally chose. Fortunately this was not the case, and even more fortunate, they had changed the time to 8 pm, which was more convenient for me. I received another confirmation, but the next day I got another e-mail titled “Last chance to re-RSVP for Avatar Day.” It was exactly the same as the last, only now the only theater to choose from was the 34th Street AMC, which I had no intention of going to, as they’re dirty liars and don’t have a true IMAX screen. I was worried I may not get to go, but decided to stick with Lincoln Square and just hope it all worked out. Thankfully my ticket was still valid, but I left the whole experience feeling like FOX was deliberately fucking with me.

My friend Rob Malone mentioned a rumor he had heard that the company had given avatarmovie.com a very small bandwidth, intentionally crashing it, to create the illusion that the demand was very high. As reports hit of the crash, FOX gave press releases stating that there had been a massive demand, and all the screenings were completely full. This turned out to be total bullshit. My screening was barely half-full, and it was then that the pieces started to come together: FOX is worried. This movie cost a shit-ton of money. There’s a lot riding on it. They’re worried about the lackluster response it’s getting, so instead of allowing it to naturally create buzz for itself, they’re subverting the public to create buzz for it. There was no overflowing demand for the screening- it was all deceit.

I’m pretty sure, however, that Cameron had nothing to do with it. FOX is notoriously, a movie studio of pure evil, headed by a collection of Satan’s accountants and Darth Vader’s apprentices. Cameron is a good guy, and a great director, and even though this movie isn’t exactly blowing anyone away, I don’t want to give him a bad rap. This movie probably was revolutionary four years ago when they started production, or fifteen years ago when it went into development. Sometimes movies get stuck in development hell, and I think it’s no one’s fault (except maybe the occultist FOX marketing team) that the film just isn’t hitting the mark. And regardless, I have to give Cameron credit where credit is due. Dude still knows how to orchestrate a fucking action sequence. I’ll get into it in more detail below, but some of the action scenes I saw in the preview were absolutely stunning. And I have to give him props for trying something new, difficult and imaginative. I just wish he had been a little more forward-thinking when he was working on this, instead of culling from not only his own movies, but every other sci-fi movie, videogame, or book ever made. Despite the poor art direction, this movie looks beyond unique. I’ve never seen anything quite like it. But from what I’ve grasped of the story and the dialogue- Cameron’s not breaking any waves here, and I feel like after District 9, which was so fresh and original yet familiar at the same time, Avatar is going to come and go with a whimper. D9 will definitely leave 2009 as the reigning sci-fi champion.

But don’t get the impression that I didn’t like what I saw. I did. A LOT. I will definitely see this movie on IMAX 3D at Lincoln Center at midnight December 18th. Like I said, there’s never been a movie like it, so regardless of the story quality, it’s a must-see. But that’ll probably be the first, and last time I ever watch the movie from beginning to end.

Now, a little more detail on what was shown, and what I thought about it (SPOILER ALERT):

-After an intro from a 100-foot tall Jim Cameron, we got a bit of an introduction scene, where we first see our hero, Jake Sully (Sam Worthington) as he listens to Col. Quaritch (Stephen Lang) give the troops a lowdown on the planet of Pandora, and basically how everything there, including the giant sentient inhabitants, want to kill you.
-Next, we got to see the scene where Sully’s consciousness gets transferred to his Na’avi avatar. The little 2001 “light tunnel” effect was pretty stunning in 3D, and I liked how Jake was so happy about being able to walk again, that he sort of loses his shit.
-The next scene was the first real action sequence and kicked some serious ass. Jake, Sigourney Weaver and some other dude, all in Na’avi avatars, confront some big-ass triceratops like thing, and then get chased by a huge lizard-leopard beast. This really showcased the 3D, especially when the beast was leaping through dead logs and the like. But this wasalso when I noticed: this whole fucking movie is CG isn’t it? Because once Jake enters his avatar, he’s a CG creature, and a really cheesy one at that, so while the rest of the preview was all very stunning, it did feel a little artificial at times.
-The next two scenes introduced Zoe Saldana (Uhura from Star Trek)’s character, a Na’avi called Neytiri. This is where the movie started to get a little silly. Because it basically devolved into Dances with Aliens. The Na’avi talk like a mentally-challenged cross between a native African and a Native American, and are all “one with nature” and shit, using the animals to their advantage and saying bullshit like “you have a good heart.” Their language even sounds like Swazi. While I liked the bioluminescent forest, I couldn’t help but feel like I was watching Jar-Jar Binks and the Gungans: The Movie. Even a scene where Jake tames some pterodactyl-like thing failed to impress.

But still, overall: I was blown away. This movie won’t be the revolution everyone hoped, and thus, it’ll probably be a disappointment for many. But I think if you go in with low expectations, and try to ignore the film’s failings, you’ll have a great time, and will feel like you were just transported to another world, even if it’s one that could never exist in real life. A lot of people are bummed because of the over-hyping. Before, I heard that the film’s technology allowed you to watch it without 3D glasses, and that the CGI was going to be more photorealistic than anything anyone had ever seen before. Neither is the case. It isn’t realistic, it’s fantasy, and if you approach it like that, I think you’ll be pleasantly surprised.

Unlike FOX, AMC had a great marketing plan. Everyone who attended Avatar Day got a coupon that gave you one free popcorn with purchase of a soda, and allowed you to buy a ticket for any of the night’s films at matinee price. Andrés and I just couldn’t pass this up, so we got tickets for Quentin Tarantino’s latest, Inglourious Basterds, which I will review later today.