I just realised that I completely forgot about Christmas, sooo...

Hope you have had fantastical tidings and plenty of eggnogg on that day!

Belated Happy Christmas everyone!

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2013 Movie List...?

Since the end of the world didn't come along (yet, anyway), here's my 2013 movie list!

1. Hansel and Gretel: Witch Hunters (January 25th)
2. Warm Bodies (February 1st)
3. Jack the Giant Slayer (March 1st)
4. Oz: Great and Powerful (March 8th)
5. G.I. Joe: Retaliation (March 29th)
6. Iron Man 3 (May 3rd)
7. Star Trek Into Darkness (May 17th)
8. Man of Steel (June 14th)
9. World War Z (June 21st)
10. Monsters University (June 21st)
11. R.I.P.D. (July 19th)
12. The Wolverine (July 26th)
13. 300: Rise of an Empire (August 2nd)
14. Sin City: A Dame to Kill for (October 4th)
15. Thor: The Dark World (November 8th)
16. 47 Ronin (December 25th)

For the last six, no trailers are available yet, so links will go up when they're finally available.

A number of the above were supposed to be released in 2012 (namely, items #3, #5, #9 and #16), so here's to hoping that there're no more push-backs in 2013.

Here's to hoping that I get to see all of the above next year! Toodles!

Edit (04/01/2015): Included trailer links to all and removed 's' from "World" (#15).

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Dredd (2012)

Late-posted because, though I didn't find it 'meh', the graphic violence did leave me a bit speechless.

[I'm such a sissy.]

Preamble aside, this movie is a far departure from Sylvester Stallone-starrer Judge Dredd from 1995, which (if I remembered correctly) was more camp than anything, and raised the ire of fans worldwide because he removed his helmet.

[And possibly also, Rob Schneider.]

Unlike other reboots, this movie doesn't waste time on origin-story or introductions, and we only see Karl Urban (in poor lighting) put on his helmet and be done with. The storyline itself is also pretty simplistic, but it sets the background for Dredd and his rookie (assigned to Dredd for final assessment), as they take down villains and rack up the body count on both sides.

It is a wee bit gratuituous for my taste, but damn if it isn't lovely to behold. The movie does this through (the aptly-named) Slow-Mo, a drug which slows the user's perception of time to 1% of the brain's normal processing speed. One particular scene that stands out is a Slow-Mo user, seeing the carnage unfold around him as Dredd and Cassandra (his rookie, who is also psychic, by the way) kick down the door and riddle everyone else with bullets.

I think the only thing that sticks in my mind after all this time is the glorious violence. The visuals are what makes the movie stand out, so do check it out if you don't mind gore too much.


For me, my enjoyment was marred by the violence. I guess I'm just conditioned to summer-movie material, where there are no blood and guts, and a literal back-breaking scene that didn't look like backs had really been broken.

No wonder this movie wasn't released in the summer.

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The end wasn't nigh.

21 December 2012 was two days ago, and looks like we're all still standing.

I was actually kinda excited (in a good way, not in a Doomsday Prepper way) about this whole end-of-the-world business, yannoe.

After all, how often does this kind of thing happen, right?

This was a topic of discussion over lunch early this week, and my colleague told us that she heard that the world was to end at 11.11am, Friday.

Reading the paper on the can Friday morning, I found out that it would actually be 7.11pm, Friday.

Since I was on leave (skipped out on the X'mas party, yeah!), my mom and I went to look at washing machines, before lunching and going home. I napped on-and-off, and woke at around 5pm to massively heavy (and seemingly torrential) rains outside.

First thing I thought was, "40 days and 40 nights."

[The Biblical one, not the Josh Hartnett one.]

Even before I dozed off I wasn't that all afraid about what was coming. I guess the mild panic only set in during the last few hours, especially when it seemed the rain didn't seem to let up for quite a while.

Anyway, the rain stopped at 6-plus, and at 7.11pm, there was no rain at all.

Well, as we currently know, nothing of apocalyptic significance or import happened, unless 'Patient Zero' surfaced somewhere and is being hushed-up.

So since for now, Friday finished on a pretty dull (and slightly disappointing) note for me, I'd like to sign off with this little picture of a cat (gotten from the Mayans' 'official' Twitter)...

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What a week.

Apart from the previous post, it has been an extremely eventful last-two-workdays-of-the-week, and to top it all off, someone found 50 bucks, tossed it on my desk, and ran off.

Due to my completely being in shock that 50 bucks had been found and the uncertainty that it was mine, I wasn't quick enough to grab the 50 bucks and throw it at his departing back.

And to top it all off, I now have a migraine that either means that I'm falling sick, or that my period is being an idiot.

That, I guess, is about all I have, since I've been working late (and like mad!) the past few nights.

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Don't headache and text...

I just sent two texts to my boss, the first originally meant for my mom, the second, to tell my mom that I accidentally sent the first to my boss.

FML.

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Skyfall (2012)

I'm not a James Bond fan, but I heard glowing reviews (Ebert's wasn't out yet at the time) and decided to catch it. And, on opening day even! Know why?

Annual leave, baby!

*overdue and kinda spoilerrific*

The plot is generally a departure from the usual Bond formula, as in there's no more world domination this time around. Rather, Bond's superior, M, faces an enemy from the past that's returned to haunt (and attack) her on a large scale, and of course, it's up to Bond to save the day.

I've not seen any of the Daniel Craig Bond movies (my last was Die Another Day), so I thought they'd done away with the stylized opening titles in favour of realism and more grit. I was pretty much blown away by the music videoopening titles. Usually the opening theme scenes reflect what's to come, but maybe I missed spotting that out during the movie.

Compared to most Bond movies where the focus is on Bond, women and gadgets, this one (thankfully) doesn't really focus that much on the women (which I guess adds glamour to espionage, but doesn't really serve much apart from eye candy). The only girl (Judi Dench is a woman) I could stand was Berenice Marlohe (who gets shot offscreen too soon); Naomie Harris doesn't seem to be able to walk properly, and this annoyed the stuffing out of me whenever she has a scene where she's not sitting or running or being stationary (and she has quite a bit of those). Forgive me for being nitpicky on something so minor, but she does have quite a few scenes of her own.

On the gadget side, things are still minimal and not as full-blown technological as the Brosnan Bond films, though I laughed when the new Q (played by Ben Whishaw) takes a dig at good ol' exploding pens.

["We don't really do those anymore."]

Though there's plenty of high-octane action to keep things going, the pacing of the story is a bit slow, as first we had to find out who and where the guy at the beginning was, then we had to find out who he was working for, then we had to find a person who could snitch the whereabouts of that first dude's employer.

*deep breath*

My point is, we don't even see or find out who the main villain is till the middle of the film. And after a brief exposition and a fairly-long escape attempt, we progress to the third act where you have a Scottish stand-off and the villain dies kind-of lamely.

[Yes, the movie is that long.]

Which is a shame, really, because the movie could do with more Javier Bardem. One of the things that make me love a movie is seeing an actor having a ton of fun with his onscreen character, and that kind of fun is usually infectious. Pulling off another bad hair day as the psychotic Raoul Silva, Bardem steals every scene he's in, though Revenge is a dish most often served.

I really don't mind the focus on development and backstory on the good guys (especially M), but you can't have an entertaining villain on film and then give him less than 50% of screen-time.

And on an EDITED final note: Skyfall itself is actually rather disappointing. You'd think that with a term like Skyfall it'd at least be a weapon of mass destruction, but no.

Overall, it's a good, entertaining film, but I'm still not seeing the big deal about it, nor do I feel that Dench deserves an(other) Oscar for Skyfall, despite her commendable turn as the cool and ruthless M, who's feeling the repercussions from her past actions.

Oh well, at least she's in this one for longer than 10 minutes.

[FYI, Dench won a Supporting Actress Oscar for Shakespeare in Love.]

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Running and piling?

Just saw the trailer for World War Z, and for a brief excited moment I thought it wasn't pushed back at all, and would opening this year as planned.

[It's not.]

Considering this is a trailer for a zombie movie, there aren't really any close-ups of the zombies; only tons and tons of running, piling, most-likely-rabid people.

The movie looks good enough, though. Running zombies are just updated versions of the old, but for me, the walking, shambling ones are easier to outrun.

Anyway, below is the embedded vid. Enjoy!



Since it's based on a book, I guess I've something else to check out at the bookstore soon.

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Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter (2012)

I watched this movie in July. On opening weekend.

I think I delayed on this because, though I enjoyed it, it was rather 'meh' and I couldn't really get my thoughts together (which was kinda close to none). Admittedly, it wasn't as 'meh' as Avatar, but even I could summon words to describe how 'meh' I felt about Avatar at the time.

[Nowadays, 'meh' makes me speechless.]

*not too many spoilers*

This film is basically a biography of Abraham Lincoln, former US president, except it posits that important events in Lincoln's life were influenced by vampires.

Which in turn, led to cool axe-swinging, but I digress.

The main reason why I went to see this movie was because of Timur Bekmambetov, the guy who directed the awesome Day Watch (and the not-that-awesome Wanted), and you can see his chaotic style of action . And by 'chaotic', I don't mean it's messy or anything; it just brings about a sense of helter-skelter that's gorgeous to look at.

Watch Day Watch, and you'll see what I mean.

The pacing in the first half is relatively slow, even though it had the horse scene (which didn't do much for it), but I guess action buffs wouldn't be disappointed. The only action bit I enjoyed was the final scenes on top of the train, which had Lincoln fighting hordes of vampires back-to-back with his best friend, and only using an axe between the both of them.

[It was thrilling.]

Despite the pacing, involving vampires did make everything a lot more interesting. Who would've thought the Civil War was about vampires holding the Confederate South? That the slave trade was thriving because vampires needed food? Who'da thunk?

The ending was surprisingly poignant. Lincoln's vampire mentor offers him immortality, telling him that the both of them could go through history and kill vampires and make the world safer for it. Lincoln refuses the offer, saying that a man's actions instead make him immortal, and leaves for that fateful evening at the theatre.

It shows us that even in historical fiction, you can't change history.

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Feeling a bit more euphoric than usual...

But I'm still out of words, so I still can't finish posts that I've started. Sigh.

I'm sorry that the majority of my posts nowadays seem to revolve around how down in the dumps I am, and how I'm unable to finish my posts, bla bla freakin' bla.

Well, I'm on leave tomorrow, I have a semi-long weekend, and I am feeling the uplift (for the record, I don't know whether that's a proper word), so Imma try to get one or two posts out by this weekend.

Happy Thursday Night, y'all!

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'Awesome'...

...is usually used in a positive context, e.g.,

"Despite the bitchin', The Avengers is probably one of the most awesome(st) movies of all time."

However, the root word for 'awesome' is 'awe', and with that, well, just because you feel awed at something, doesn't necessarily mean that that something is a good thing.

[You get my thing?]

Case in point: your house is dangerously close to being overrun by zombies.

Since we're approaching December 2012, I do apologise for the reminder on the apocalypse, but I've been playing Plants and Zombies for a while now, and am loving every minute of it.

Back to the English lesson, nobody in their right mind (ha!) would use 'awesome' to describe this situation. Not even if you were a zombie, because then you'd be stuck outside with your fellow undead and, on the presumption that the human is home alone, there's only one brain to be had by all and sundry.

But if we use 'awesome' to describe the zombies en masse (there's really a lot of them outside your house), to describe their formidable numbers... we wouldn't be wrong.

That's the downside of 'awesome'. Size matters.

Now, the best (or, rather, awesome) thing about this word is that it can also describe a host of other things about our situation:

...like how your door's made of awesomely-strong oak, thus currently stagnating any zombie progress into your humble abode.

...the awesome house your awesome door is attached to; your house hasn't caved in yet despite all (if not most) of the undead within a 50-mile radius banging on your house walls.

[Or goodness knows what else it is they're doing to your house walls.]

...the fact that the apocalypse is already upon us and the Internet still works, making it an awesomely useless luxury.

...and finally, like you, dear awesome reader, who, in this hypothetical end-of-the-world situation, is still looking at this post.

[Thank you very much!]

Though I must say, I am pretty awesome myself for putting out a post at this time, what with all the zombies roaming about.


Last overuse of the word, I promise.

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Just finished the A Memory Of Light prologue.

And wow.

Simply. Wow.

In my earlier post about the titbits released, I mentioned that there was nothing much to shout about.

But the full prologue, a super-duper long one divided into many parts (Talmanes's POV alone has four-five parts, I think), just blew me away.

Detouring a bit, I'm re-reading Towers of Midnight and The Gathering Storm for comparison's sake, because I found Towers oddly inconsistent in writing style, which distracted me from the main story at hand. Maybe I'm just being anal about this.

[And yes, 'anal' can be worked into regular conversation without it being dirty.]

Despite the filleropening on Jarid Sarand, the prologue jumps straight into the events that ended the last book (Towers). It's very, very fast-paced, moving from Talmanes trying to halt the Trolloc invasion of Andor, to Slayer (a character I'm very interested in) having a meeting in a town within the Blight. We also get to see the Forsaken (always interesting stuff), and plus, somebody got bloody promoted!!

I'll just leave it at that; my jaw dropped.

And the flow is much better, this time around. Granted, things move a lot quicker than they normally would, but reading this feels like Jordan again. Well done, Brandon Sanderson.

Very well done.

Although I'm kinda not digging you at the moment, because you made Talmanes die really slowly. And you're giving me hope that he will survive the entire thing, because even Masema had a death that was better-written than this.

[I wanna see Talmanes laugh more!]

Cannot flippin' wait for January 8, 2013. Hope the majority of us are not part of the undead by then.

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I feel quite alone sometimes.

Sure, I still have my mom.

But I feel very isolated, very far removed from other non-familial people occasionally.

Like now, fr'instance.

I mean, okay, I may be a bit anti-social, but not to the extent where I blatantly insult them or pointedly ignore them or anything like that. I think I'm still generally nice to peoples, and I make it a point to scrunch my face upsmile whenever eye contact's made.

I don't exactly know what I'm doing wrong, apart from being a bit introverted. It's not that I don't talk to people.

And sometimes when people walk by my place (they're not looking for me, by the way) I do stare at my laptop, but I've seen other people do it. It's called FOCUSSING ON WORK.

If from the upper corners of my eyes I see them look down at me, then I'll look up and smile back. Half the time when I do initiate the look up, they're not looking back at me either, so I can't see what the big deal is.

Sigh. Off-topic, I'm on leave today and I had to spend two hours (at home) staring at payroll, and just this evening, another two hours in office to take an overseas call.

This week really could be better :S

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Feeling slightly bittersweet.

Yesterday, I managed to catch the last, final episode ever of Beelzebub. Entirely by accident.

You see, I'm usually able to watch the show at 10.30pm every day, but for the past few nights I've been missing the episodes, due to work and stuff.

So last night, after watching Fringe, I switched to Animax to watch what little Beelzebubis left. Usually the show finishes around the same time as Fringe(though they have different start-times), so by the time I change the channel, Beelzebub would be in its end-credits.

But not last night.

I'm super glad that my timing was impeccable, for once.

I wish the show ran for more seasons. If my mom wasn't watching the TV as well, I would've totally teared up at the final scenes.

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Just to show how psyched I amwas about The Avengers

I had this dream one week before the 26 April premiere. Struck out the 'am' because I'd planned for this post to go out in the last week of April, but as usual...

Anyway, in my dream, I was watching The Avengers on my laptop. I wasn't home, but I don't think I was at work either, as I wasn't busy looking over my shoulder and switching windows at intervals. I think I even felt slightly bad for watching this ahead of everyone, but I figured, hey, I get to watch this before everyone else.

Okay, so for some reason, the Avengers had to sneak into a hospital to interrogate the suspect, and in doing so, they disguised themselves as hospital staff. RDJ was there; so was ScarJo and Chris Evans.

The perp figured that there was something amiss and decided to make a run for it. He wasn't looking where he was going, made a wrong turn, accidentally smashed into a glass window, and falls right out. The hospital is actually in a high-rise.

[Just bear with me here.]

As the perp's falling (it's a very tall building), the Hulk suddenly swings towards the building, and body-slams the perp into one of the floors (forgive me if I'm not describing this properly), going through a ton of glass (windows, doors, etc.). Since the Hulk had shielded our perp through the broken glass, he was so cut by all that glass that he was also literally sliced in half. Partway, though; top down right to his purple pants.

And the best part? He wasn't dead yet. With his half-spliced body, he spun around a number of times (in total cartoon-y fashion), and regenerated.

At that point I actually dreamtthought to myself that I'm soooo gonna Wiki the Incredible Hulk after the movie.

And it's only now that the opening titles roll, in fairly cheesy B-grade effects. The camera pans over onto the top of the 'Marvel' logo, with a voice-over from Sam Jackson, saying something about 'avenging' (very similar to what RDJ says right before the "I have an army/We have a Hulk" exchange).

The camera then zooms out for the rest of the titlecard, and what do we get?

Cyrillic. Turns out I got myself the Russian bootleg.

*shudder*

Most noticeably absent from my dream was Loki, which surprised me to no end since he (well, Hiddles) was the person I'm most looking forward to seeing in The Avengers.

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A Memory of Light has been pushed back!

Again!

And I was so looking forward to October 2012 :(

Previously, the initial date was set at October 2011; now it's been pushed as far back as January 2013.

I'm guessing it's probably due to current writer Brandon Sanderson and Robert Jordan's people trying to make the book perfect-er. It is the big kahuna of the series, the one book that fans have been waiting for 22 years.

[Yes, the first book was released in 1990. How time flies.]

Tor's website even released first parts (as in, PoVs) of both the prologue and Chapter 1. They're short bits, nothing much to shout about.

Prologue's about Jarid Sarand, whom I've completely forgotten about. Sarand is one of the rebels against the Elayne's throne Succession, which was so painfully (and rather needlessly) drawn out and boring that when re-reading the later books, I skim through chapters involving her. If there was ever a definition for 'filler', the Succession arc would be it.

[Spanning two to three encyclopedia-sized tomes /fml]

The Chapter 1 portion is disappointingly short, about Rand meeting up with Perrin again and catching up.

The publisher's site says that in the coming months more of the prologue and Chapter 1 will be released (same as previous releases), so hopefully there'd be something substantial to tide us over till 2013.

Sigh. That Mayan prophecy better not come true till after I've read that book!

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Only August, and I've had twice as many posts as last year!

Well, close to 'twice', if you don't count short posts like this one.

Yay, me!! GREAT SUCCESS!! *thumbs up*

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Insidious (2011)

*spoiler-laden*

Insidious relies on classic, old-fashioned type of scares: bumps-in-the-night, greatly-suspicious-room-corners, corner-of-your-eye sightings, etc. What horror movie wouldn't be complete with cupboards bursting open and creepy children running out?

[Also, the over-hyphenation of my first paragraph.]

I've basically described the first half of Insidious in that paragraph.

Which is a shame, because during the first hour or so, the movie was truly scary. Our definition of a horror movie nowadays is limited to torture and/or death porn, and it's awfully refreshing to watch a non-handheld camera / -"true story" movie with all the low-budget trappings. This from James Wan and Leigh Whannell, the guys that re-introduced torture porn to the world with the first Saw movie (which then led to the overbloated Saw franchise).

[I gave up after # 4.]

It even builds up as a psychological thriller at first, as you're given to wonder whether these things are actually happening, or whether the wife (played by Rose Byrne) is actually losing her mind and hallucinating a red-eyed black demon due to her son's comatose state.

Mid-way, there's a very, very good scene with mother-in-law Barbara Hershey (I'm using all real names here), where she relates to Byrne and Patrick Wilson (who plays the husband) about a dream she had about their son. The story is shown in scenes flashing between her retelling and the dream itself, so that we could see what she saw. With the lack of lighting (only a small bedside lamp) and the comatose boy, you don't even notice the demon in the corner until it (slowly) raises a shadowy arm and points at the boy.

Immediately after Hershey ends her story and looks at Wilson, the demon popped up from right behind him to give us all a jolly bejesus-ridding. I still get goosebumps from that scene.

After that, it got slightly disappointing. My gripe with the movie lies in the second act, where explanations happen.

Astral projection. Really?

I mean, within the context of the movie it does fit well with the sudden occurrences: the boy's spirit had wandered too far from his body, which is why malevolent spirits are looking to inhabit his currently-empty physical self. Possession takes time and energy; which is why the spirits haven't actually gotten down to the actual relocating yet, and are merely having some fun with Rose Byrne. But then you toss in Wilson's backstory (he had a similar episode to his son's when he was young, but blocked it out from memory), and then astral-projects himself in order to lead his son's soul back into his body...

From hints and hauntings to actual confrontations with the spirits (plus some freaky-deaky encounters in the spirit world which, though interesting, were not fully explained), you have quite a departure from the tone set earlier in the movie.

Mind you, even with the unexpected turn in storyline, the second half is not without scares: the turn-table scene where Leigh Whannell (yes, he's in this also) writes what psychic Lin Shaye relays to him is terrifying enough, and the subsequent scene where the spirits in question upend everything including our young boy's body (with glimpses of those spirits in trusty Polaroid photos). And the ending, of course.

Because a Wan-Whannell movie would not be complete without the obligatory twist in the end. But the set-up for it doesn't make sense. When you are getting your son's soul out, you do not stop halfway and yell at the ghost that used to haunt you. You get back into your body first, then you start yelling.

In case you're not spoiled yet... good.

One thing's for sure, you'll never look at ceiling corners the same way ever again.

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Double Feature: The Expendables (2010) and The Expendables 2 (2012)

The Expendables was a review I never got around to writing.

Sure, I enjoyed it, but the more I postponed my completion of the review, the more the movie became a bit 'meh' for me, and I really couldn't pull all my points together for a proper review.

Testosterone? Check. Action? Adequate enough. Looking back, my gripe about the movie was the slight emphasis on Jason Statham's character. Nothing against Statham, but leave a bit more screen-time for the others, eh?

This didn't mean that the movie wasn't fun, but I would say that most of the fun came from the cast line-up. Up until then, I didn't even know how much I'd missed Dolph Lundgren, and thus, got a massive huge kick out of watching him and Jet Li duke it out on-screen.

I was quite glad to see him not die at the end.

[Review for numero dos starts now.]

The idea behind The Expendables is awesome in the sense that it can be considered as the mother of all action movies. Just as how The Avengers is the mother of all superhero movies (at least, until that Justice League movie materialises), The Expendables collects action stars old and (semi-) young, and weaves them a shared storyline for our viewing pleasure.

And that list is not exhausted yet.

It’s the nostalgia factor that gets to me. How often do you see Lundgren these days? Or, though he has a reason, Arnold Schwarzenegger? Jean-Claude Van Damme even? Or Chuck flippin’ Norris?

Like taking a trip down memory lane.

And no worries to be had here about egos. Half of the stars in the movie haven't really been in anything big in a long while.

Did I say I totally miss Dolph Lundgren?

The first movie didn't exactly explore its homage potential, apart from a few jabs at Schwarzenegger's stint as Governator of California. As Arnie's role (and others) have been expanded in this sequel, I'm very pleased to announced that there are homages and pop culture references a-plenty (especially for the more established action stars), and with that, it's basically a chance for all the old-timers to poke fun at themselves and each other.

And it works. Granted, the cheese and cliched-dialogue factor is ultimately at an all-time high, but
It so does. One of the best scenes in this movie involves Chuck Norris. Let’s just say that he’s capable of being an Expendable (note the singular) all by himself.

This time around, Lundgren (yay!!), Terry Crews and Randy Couture, who round out the rest of the Expendables, are given more time to shine. Some of the funniest scenes in the movie involve the three.

On that note... poor Liam Hemsworth.

Action-wise, the second movie delivers far, far more than the first. From the first very-loaded-and-action-packed 15 minutes (only then we get the title card), till the final scenes where everyone in the movie poster (except for two) packs guns and knives and puts them to appropriate use, there's a ton of action to go around. I seem to notice more blood and more guts in this one, though it's been a long while since I last saw the first one. I mean, there was violence, but it's not as gratuitous as this one. Even punching begot copious amounts of blood-letting.

Jet Li fans, you may be disappointed with this outing; he’s only in this movie for 15 minutes (guess which 15), after which he takes a parachute out. Even Lundgren glares at him for that.

[Surprisingly, Li still gets third billing, right after Statham.]

It’s definitely much better than the first movie (though I think it’s well-established by now that seconds are mostly always better than firsts). Even with the inclusion of a girl proper this time around, it didn’t detract much my enjoyment of this movie.

I think I’m an awful feminist. I prefer to have my movies 100% testosterone-fuelled, rather than have a token "strong, sexy, sassy, one-of-the-boys" female member of the team. I find it redundant and unnecessary to have eye-candy for the boys when guns, grenades and booze should cut it. Luckily, this movie doesn't create any love interest notions, although for a moment I thought we might actually go down that road.

Thank goodness.

JCVD is adequately slimey as the bad guy (ha ha) Vilain (pronounced vee-layn), but the final fight between the Italian Stallion and JCVD wasn’t that all hyped to be. Maybe it’s due to different fighting styles (JCVD is more martial arts than Stallone) or due to age, but there wasn’t as much fighting as I would’ve liked.

[Fun fact: Stallone initially offered Gunnar (currently played by Lundgren) to JCVD, but JCVD declined. Totes in his face yo.]

Suggestion for The Expendables 3: Bring in Ray Park, please! Then he can have a showdown with Jet Li (hopefully). Someone should also bring in Steven Seagal. I’m sure Stallone can fit him in somewhere. Apparently, the third movie is in the process of signing Nicolas Cage (NOT THE BEES!!!), and they’re looking to get Clint Eastwood, Harrison Ford and BladeWesley Snipes.

I can hardly wait.

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Girls are (privately) very dirty creatures.

Location in point: my office toilet.

You'd think that, with so many girls in the office, all of us educated professionals, someone would at least know how to flush the toilet.

Or at least, look behind to check whether there are any... leftovers.

Every year (or when the company gets the chance), we are reminded to keep the bathrooms clean, to not gross people out be considerate of others, etc., but... eh. Our cubicle doors even have paper reminders taped on their insides. Some of them are at squat level; for purposeful (though I doubt its intended effectiveness) reading while tinkling.

Speaking of 'tinkling', this reminds me of a phrase:

If you sprinkle when you tinkle, 

be a sweetie and wipe the seatie.

The rhyming helps make it adorable :)

Just today, I saw a massive turd the size of a meatball (of the spaghetti kind, not the fishball-beefball variety) in the front part of the squat bowl in one of the cubicles, and a few hours later, another toilet (bowl, this time) wasn't flushed properly and there was... residue.

...wait, I can't call it 'residue', that means 'little'. By any indication, the water was already murkied up, so 'residue' is not the appropriate word to use.

Right now, the right word does not come to mind. But it'll come.

[It always does. *snide laughter*]

Seriously, all the time taken by the girls in my office to look pretty (and they do doll themselves up!), and they can't even spare a bloody second to look back at what they literally crapped out.

It doesn't even take a MINUTE to be this considerate.

I tend not to hear any complaints about the men's bathroom (or maybe my ear-dar isn't as good as I think it is), but the way I see it, guys only just have to worry about your average browns and yellows.

We girls, on the other hand, have also to keep an eye out for the reds.

Every other week I see red (ha ha), be it diluted or be haemoglobin-rich. Every other week I wonder how is it that these girls can't even notice red-on-porcelain white, which is FAR easier to notice compared to yellow/brown variations-on-porcelain.

One time, I saw a big drop (about an inch in diameter) by the cubicle door. Never mind whether the lighting made the brown look red or whether my eyes need to be checked. The viscosity was too thick to be water and the flippin' cubicle door is at least two feet away from the squat bowl.

How on bloody (literally) earth did that drop get all the way over there?!! I mean, you would have to do some serious gymnastics to get your, ahem, vajayjay all the way there.

It's unfathomable.

The only way I can imagine that getting there is: if the person, having realised there was no more toilet paper in that cubicle, ran out, grabbed the paper towels by the sink, and ran back into the cubicle again without having made herself presentable before exiting said cubicle.

I don't think I need to elaborate my definition of the word 'presentable'.

I shudder for both her sake, and that of the if-unfortunate-enough fellow female who happened to tag into the bathroom common at the moment our culprit had her pants around her legs.

[I rule out skirts. Drippings would more likely to get onto the skirt, rather than the floor.]

This post brought to you by eternal optimism. Oh, wit (or at least, some semblance of wit), how have I missed you!

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Bliss, still!

It's been a little over a week since my last post, and I'm at an all-time high.

I'm still lazy to go to the gym, but I'm guessing the immobility bit is inborn.

For once, I'm feeling optimistic and, dare I say it, perky about life in general. I just noticed that I no longer (for the moment) glare at people for being happy.

I don't exactly have anything to be over-joyful about, so I'm still in the dark over the source of my new-found happiness.

Anyway, I'd just like to share this adorable video about pudding, taken from Beelzebub. It's an anime about a demon baby and his high-school-delinquent caretaker, and they go on to have misadventures and fight demons. I'm just crazy about this show right now. It's ridiculously funny, with plenty of fourth wall-breaking (which is my kind of humor), and I've discovered four amazing songs from its opening and end credits.

[Will post on those in my next one.]

Watch and hope you enjoy!



Hambagu! :D

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Oh, bliss!

How infrequent this feeling doth come!

I'm strangely happy, for some reason. It's an extremely rare occurrence, so once-in-a-blue-moon that it's very noticeable.

And at this point, it's all the more surprising, because I'm really mired in some deep crap and I'm not out of the woods yet, but I'm experiencing an emotion that remotely feels like 'positive'.

I think I've been in a depressive funk for a very long while. I'm not exactly sure whether it actually is depression, but I'd looked up the symptoms once, and I've got most of them, except for the fact that I'm not sad and I don't feel like killing or hurting myself.

I guess depression would explain the writer's block. A term I happened across was "brain fog", which would describe a typical work day for me.

Today, on the other hand... clarity. For the first time in a very long while.

So, on a slightly higher note, Imma go enjoy this while it lasts. Happy weekend, everyone!

EDIT: I have highly irregular time-of-the-months. Turns out it's now. At least I know I've a few days left.

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The London Olympics Opening Ceremony replay (in Malaysia) sucks.

Just caught it on local TV just now. Apart from Kenneth Branagh (whom I was not expecting and thus, was blindsided by, in a good way), I was sorely disappointed.

Where was the Mary Poppins vs. Voldemort battle? Where was the Muse performance? I admit that the forging of the Olympic rings was pretty cool, but that was about it. Where the bloody 'ell was Rupert Grint in the Olympic torch-passing scene?

[Though he may have been left out :P]

So I took to the Internet, to see whether everything was a rumor.

It wasn't. But Muse was, sadly.

There were pictures of a giant Voldemort fighting a ton of Mary Poppinses, which would have been completely EPIC. I mean, even Rowan bloody Atkinson had a flippin' segment, and I would have been delighted to no end to see him in the opening ceremony.

I went to YouTube to search for the opening ceremony videos, and thankfully, there were. There was even one of Daniel Craig as James Bond, escorting the Queen to the Games and then bloody parachuting down into the stadium!! I can't really tell whether it's the real Queen or an extremely good look-alike, but I don't think they would fake the Queen.

It is the Olympics, after all.

The full video on YouTube (coveirng the entire ceremony) is four hours long. Four. Bloody. Hours!! And on local TV, this was just cut short to TWO STINKIN' HOURS!

WHY. WHY THE BLOODY CRAP WHY WOULD YOU 'REPLAY' THE TELECAST IF IT'S NOT GOING TO BE THE ENTIRE THING.

WHY.

I can understand cutting out the musical segments. Paul McCartney is hardly relevant to us here. But cutting out Mary Poppins vs. Voldemort? Cutting out Mr Bean?

I don't freaking get it.

Now I have to load a four hour-long video, just to see the entire opening ceremony. Bollocks.

EDIT: They showed a bit of McCartney at the end, in closing the opening ceremony. Apparently there were also yellow submarines. Argh.

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What does McDonald's think about gay marriage?

[Ronald thinks it's tame LOL.]

Found this gem off PerezHilton's:

Last one's my personal favorite :)

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Well, I'm still not dead...

I took a really hard knock to the noggin' yesterday night. Banged it against the corner of the shelf when I stood straight up from switching on the computer plug.

Though I didn't see stars, I got nauseous after an hour or so, but I wasn't sure whether it was a concussion or  whether it was from using my computer too long.

The part of my skull that got bumped still tingles, but it doesn't feel like there's any lasting damage to my brain matter.

I mean, I still love movies. Still love the entertainment industry and all its gossip.

[Still in love with The Avengers.]

I can still tell when I'm being emotional (read: hormonal) over nothing.

I still have a thing for Tom Hiddleston, though I find it a bit odd that an actor worth his salt would hawk his own autograph, if not for charity. None of the other A-listers do it.

Unrequited love is still the story of my life.

My math skills has gone a bit down. I tried to mentally calculate what's 52.30 divided by 6 and I arrived at 8.6-ish.

[It's 8.71]

And just now I found it a bit of a struggle to divide 48 by 3. I thought the answer was 6.

[It's actually 16.]

Shit.

But I'm still a grammar Nazi, which is a good thing.

Sigh. Hope I don't need to get a CAT scan.

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The Dark Knight Rises (2012)

I read a number of reviews saying that Rises is not as good as the previous one, The Dark Knight, and I would respectfully disagree.

TDK is about how darkness and evil can corrupt even the most upstanding of citizens, and in a way, it's about lacking faith in humanity.

For me, it's right on par with TDK, though villain-wise, Bane is not nearly as unpredictable and time-bomby as the enigmatic Joker of TDK. I found Bane interesting enough, though, probably because I had been ruined by Batman and Robin, where Bane was depicted as a mindless minion that is all brawn.

As a result of that horrible, horrible movie, I never thought Bane could be primary villain material. Played by Tom Hardy (a far cry from his skinny Star Trek: Nemesis days), Bane blew me away. He reminds me a little of Theodore "T-Bag" Bagwell (from Prison Break), who seems redneck white trash enough but doesn't speak at all like one.

[And from then on, I've been taken by Robert Knepper.]

Frankly, I'm still not over the fact that Bane is not an idiot. But I digress.

This is a movie about a hero that falls and then rises again, which thematically, plays out in plot and music throughout the movie. That anthemic chant you hear in the trailer? It's in the opening scenes, and in most of Bane's. Surprisingly, this movie uses more elements from the comic books than the previous ones. It's still the gritty crime thriller that we all come to expect from Nolan's Batman movies, but the main difference in this is that it has far more action than its predecessors.

You even get to see the infamous back-breaking scene midway, though it doesn't look as brutal and iconic as originally drawn.

I loved how this movie brings the trilogy to full circle, in both storyline and sentiment. I won't say anymore than that, because I'm trying to practice writing spoiler-free reviews.

If you pay attention (and you will need to, as with all Christopher Nolan movies), you should be able to spot the all-usual Nolan twist way before it happens.

[And if you consider this as spoiling, obviously you've not seen a Chris Nolan movie.]


Oddly, this movie also brings to mind the Frat Pack. You see so many Nolan alumni in this one, it feels like a B-movie sequel to one of his movies where only the supporting actors return, and you find out that that sequel is completely unrelated to the original. In case you feel a bit lost here, the original I'm referring to is Inception.

So for me, I would say that Rises is right up there with TDK. No trilogy curse this time around.

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D'OH!! [Anti-climactic]

I just noted that I'd dated the Avengers movie as '2011' instead of '2012'. And you can't say I didn't warn you, because I totally did in my post title. Yoink.

Also, I know that I've been technically cheating with these seriously short posts. Worry not, I sense something long-winded this way comes, and I anticipate it to arrive sometime this year. Hopefully.

[I dare not give an ETA.]

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GREAT SUCCESS!!

Today I lostburned 100 calories!!!

[It's instances like these that make me wanna get Twitter. In due time...]

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The Amazing Spider-man (2012)

Reboots only happen when a movie franchise has run its course, both critically and financially (think George Clooney and Bat-nipples from the '90s). Admittedly, Spider-man 3 did suck ass, but it's only been five years. Really?

*No spoilers. Unless you've seen Sam Raimi's Spider-man.*

Considering that The Amazing Spider-man (TAS) goes back to the start of the story, the first half plays out like the first half of Sam Raimi's Spider-man. The only difference is that TAS is more faithful to the source material, with Peter making his own webbing devices (rather than being part of his mutated biology), Gwen Stacy being his first girlfriend (not Mary-Jane Watson) and the villain (the Lizard instead, and not arch-nemesis Green Goblin). Since we're still relatively fresh from Raimi's movies, the first part of TAS can be a bit draggy.

[The only thing missing from this movie is the iconic, “with great power comes great responsibility," line, but if you pay close attention, though, Uncle Ben kind of summarises the concept in one of the scenes.]

Surprisingly, TAS wasn't the chatty emotional dullfest I expected it to be (apparently it is based on the Ultimate Spider-man series, which had less emphasis on villains). It had sufficient action in the second act to thrill me (at least, enough to satiate my blockbuster cravings), and it also spent quite a bit of time on character development, which luckily didn't really slow the movie down at all.

Going in with no impression whatsoever of Andrew Garfield (haven't seen The Social Network), he completely bowled me over as Peter Parker. He's able to pull off being an awkward gangly teenager (despite being almost 30), and thankfully, isn't namby-pamby. Mainly, Garfield was adorable; think I may have a mini-crush now.

Special mention also goes to Rhys Ifans, who plays Dr Curt Connors/the Lizard, doing a fine job of balancing ethically-conflicted and what he actually wants (which is growing his arm back). It's a bit of a waste that Dylan Baker (who played Connors in Raimi's films) didn't get the chance to go full-on baddie, even after two instalments of foreshadowing. If you're curious to see what's been missed, he guest-stars on The Good Wife once in a while, and he's deliciously slimy in that.

Since this is the restart of the franchise, there is plenty of foreshadowing in this (there's a scene midway of the end credits), and several unresolved minor plotlines saved for the sequel. I'm hoping that they bring in Norman Osborne in the next one; he's plenty mentioned in TAS, but not seen.

I can't decide whether this trumps Raimi's first Spidey flick or vice versa, because both are equally enjoyable and both are good movies in their own right. The clearest comparison I can give is that Raimi's first is true to the definition of 'summer blockbuster', whereas TAS seems to be slated for a February/March release, rather than in July. The journey to becoming Spider-man is felt more in TAS, and in way, the timeline is slower as Peter is still in high school at the end of TAS (whereas in Raimi, everyone graduates high school quarter-way through the film).

[My only gripe with TAS is that I like Denis Leary too much.]

Although I still don't see the point in rebooting the series in such a short time, TAS is a worthy entry into the movie series. Do watch this.

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I feel so inadequate...

I was at the gym the other day (ha!), on the treadmill (double ha!), and I was all out of breath and ready to faint after a mere 5 seconds of running, while the the chick next to me was running for 5 straight minutes, and her stomach's literally hanging out for all to see.

[Because she was wearing a two-piece.]

Sigh.

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Snow White and the Huntsman (2012)

EDIT: I'm so sorry; I don't know why the stupid redaction keeps happening. I don't even use the backgrounds button.

This movie is sadly disappointing.

[And this review is sadly overdue.]

Snow White and the Huntsman starts off serious, but halfway through seems to decide otherwise, and then goes back to its Disney fairytale roots, switching back and forth.

This means pixies, and this huge stag (or was it an alpaca?) somehow 'acknowledging' that Snow White was meant to bring life and prosperity back to the land.

This inconsistency really got to me (I thought I was going to see a dark fantasy version of Snow White), and since it was being touted in all the promos as a Lord of the Rings epic kinda thing, the only thing it has in common with LOTR is that they go to battle in the end.

Despite the interesting notion of the Huntsman playing a more pivotal role in Snow White's destiny, this unfortunately was not elaborated any further than teaching her how to stab someone in the ribs. And also, unexpectedly being the one who kissed her back to life (rather than the 'prince' of the movie, William), but being not in love with Snow (she only reminded him of his dead wife), the kiss on the lips didn't really gel well with me as it didn't seem like something the Huntsman would do.

[At least kiss her on the forehead or something!]

Charlize Theron may look gorgeous as the evil Queen Ravenna (her costumes are fantastic!), but she's basically intoning everything in the same low voice, and when she's not doing that, she's screaming. They'd also included a backstory and a creepy brother, which worked, surprisingly, as it made her more interesting. I honestly don't see why everyone's raving about her performance, though admittedly, she emotes insecurity really well, especially in her scenes with her brother.

For Snow White herself, I tried to be as removed from bias as possible, but I couldn't help not seeing Bella Swan, instead of Kristen Stewart. The fact that the top part of Stewart's face still looks half-stoned didn't help, and the script didn't really make things better either (that battle speech after she woke was awkward). Apart from the Bella Swan stigma (i.e., blank-faced and slightly wide-eyed), I thought she was pretty okay.

And besides, if you wanted to go through the fairytale route, at least make her cough up that damn apple piece when she wakes up.

I have no complaints about Chris Hemsworth; he still has some goodwill leftover from being Thor.

Also, the dwarves are, in a way, redundant. Not from a plot point-of-view, but from casting; I don't see why you would cast normal-sized people, and then CG them into little people. Yes, tiny Ian McShane and tiny Bob Hoskins is adorable (actually, Hoskins is adorable no matter the size), but if Mirror, Mirror can get real little people to play dwarves, so can you.

The reason why I'm being rather harsh with this is because I was expecting dark, not semi-dark. If you're as disappointed as I am with this, do check out Snow White: A Tale of Terror, starring Sigourney Weaver as the Queen. Don't let the title mislead you; it's not too scary, but I find it's a pretty good retelling of the story.

[Better than the above, at any rate.]

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Monsters University!!!

And it's bound to be out in Summer 2013!! Eeeeeeeeee!!!

[That is, if the world hasn't ended by then.]

Enjoy the teaser to the Monsters, Inc.sequel below! Happy weekend, everyone!

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Four stakes and seven garlics ago...

EDIT: I just noticed that half of the post was redacted; apparently background color was set on white for some reason and this escaped me earlier. Apologies.

Forgive the lame attempt at putting a vampiric twist to those famous first words, but Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter just opened yesterday.

Normally I wouldn't toot about something like this (it's not The Avengers), but I just found out that it was directed by Timur Bekmambetov!!

Bekmambetov is mostly known for directing Wanted (James McAvoy and Angelina Jolie), but before that, he directed a not-so-little Russian movie called Day Watch, which I found super-confusing (on account that I can't differentiate between the male actors), but looks absolutely gorgeous in its chaotic little way.

I've been looking for the first movie, Night Watch, ever since, but no luck.

I tend to be a sucker for directors who have visual flair and make movies with sweeping camera shots and huge, glorious (albeit CG) set pieces and the occasional slow-mo action scene, with no sign of storyline anywhere.

Anyway, I hope to score some tickets on opening weekend, and should (I type that with great doubt, though) be able to have a review up shortly after that.

And no, I have not forgotten about Snow White; work has just been in the bloody way.

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"Listen, limey..."

...watch videoLady-Gaga-song parody and enjoy :)



I'm such a nerd for the original Yu-Gi-Oh series.

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Another afternoon well spent!

Four hours, this time.

I'm such a pig :P

Anyway, I have a few things lined up (including that long overdue Snow White review), so do stay tuned and stay posted! :D

Take care now, bye bye then.

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An afternoon well spent...

...is an afternoon well slept.

And sleep I did, for three totally-worth-it hours. 

[Spent at home, rather than out in the hot sun at my office's beach party.]

Never mind that I had a horribly-vivid dream while I was at it, so much so that when my mother told me to drink my barley, upon sleep relapse-and-awaken, I was unsure whether I dreamt that my mom told me drink my barley, or whether she actually did so.

She actually had.

Anyway, my dream involved deals, deal-breakers, some forensic investigating, sacrifices, and of course, a whole load of death. More on that in my next post, I've got to rearrange my thoughts and get everything down properly before I do.

Off-topic, today in church this lady in front of me farted. Not with the singular 'phut', but the 'phu-phu-phu-phut' type. 

Like Jews of old, my mother and I parted like the Red Sea.

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Third time's not so much the charm...

But it was still pretty enjoyable.

I'm referring to The Avengers, what else.

The theatre was three-quarters full. Mind you, the hall wasn't very big, but it was surprising since it was the fourth and final week of the movie's run in the theatres. And beside, only eight to ten tickets were bought up when I went to get mine (which was on the afternoon before).

I just put it down to "people who didn't get to see the movie yet."

After the first 20 minutes, it became very obvious that this wasn't anyone's first time.

For one, people weren't laughing as much as they did on opening weekend. Heck, even during my second watch people laughed louder.

The atmosphere was rather solemn, actually.

And so, partly because of the crowd, but probably mostly due to this being my third time, it wasn't as kick-ass fun as it was the first two times.

But surprisingly, I didn't get bored. It's like, one of those movies that you absolutely love, and know all the lines to, and you know that you won't be seeing it again for a very long while.

[Well, at least until it gets on HBO.]

So even though the energy wasn't really there, I still had fun. Not as much as the first time, but still there, I guess.

And of course, the Jolly Green Giant still proves irresistible in the second act. People still laughed.

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The Binding of Isaac...

...has got to be the creepiest, sickest game I've ever seen/played.

And I don't mean in a Human Centipede gore-kinda way.

[Ew.]

The opening scenes are in scribble form, which kinda looks cool. It tells of a little boy, whose religious mother suddenly starts hearing a voice from above tell her that her son is in fact, corrupted and therefore, needs to be sacrificed. The little boy, who at that point was locked up in his room by his mother to "remove all evil from his life", realises that his mother is about to kill him and manages to find a trapdoor to escape into.

To give you an idea on what it all looks (and feels) like, here's a video showing the opening:



That's when the game proper starts.

You play Isaac, the little boy in the prologue, as he wanders around his mother's basement, fighting twisted deformities and mutant suchlikes, and gathering power-ups/life-hearts, etc. Each level is quite short, but deviously difficult, and since there is no 'save' point whatsoever, if you die (which I did, very easily), you need to start over.

Despite the cutesy artwork, the look of the game is plain demented, as evidenced by the monsters and bosses that you have to defeat to get to the next level. The mechanics are very simple (just shoot whatever that moves, and whatever that doesn't, for goodies), but it's fiendishly difficult as the levels are randomly generated every time you play, plus you don't get too many soul-hearts to spare and half the items I collected I don't know what they're for, so they pretty much went to waste when I died.

[And I died a lot! I played this for two hours last night, and I did not get past Level 2 at all.]

I'm intrigued, and yet I'm freaked. I'm rather repulsed, and yet I want to keep playing because the game itself is very well-made. It's atmospheric (music always helps), and there's just so much symbolism and dual meanings and imagery to the entire premise, so much so that The Binding of Isaac Wikia has theories on the meanings of the endings, and also that the monsters may actually be Mom's miscarriages/abortions, dumped in the basement and subsequently mutated into monsters that spew blood and flies and flop around.

[Yes, it is that disgusting!!]

If you're like me (as in, you don't really think it's the journey that counts), YouTube has videos with all endings combined. Since there are 12 endings altogether, this means that you must play and sit through the entire game WITHOUT PAUSE for twelve times.

[But you can pause after you end each game. Just to be clear.]

I'm the type of person that is actually patient enough to go through a game 12 times just to discover anything and unlock everything. I can actually stand the blood and the mutant creatures and the slight gore and creepy imagery.

It's just the endings themselves I can't stomach.

I'm a happy-endings kind of person. You can put a person (in this case, a perpetually-crying naked little boy) through a ton of literal crap and flies and monsters, but if he makes it through the end, it kinda balances things out with what he's faced. Kinda like a "I survived" type of thing.

As I'm typing this, I've already spoiled myself so far that I would only be playing the game just for the challenge, and not because I want to see how things turn out. Even though majority of the endings show Isaac finding a locked item or character (that can be used or played next time around), the more-proper endings range from bleak to depressing. There's one that's particularly horrific, but that's not the point.

The reason I'm blogging this is because I've to get it out of my system. That such a unique game comes my way, and I can't go on any further because I can't handle realism. I mean, there's only so much you can take watching the poor little boy run around and lob his tears at monsters and poop. If you get the Stigmata power-up, you'll be lobbing blood instead, which apparently is more potent than water.

Sigh. After I played this last night, I went to bed and had some nightmares. I know, I'm a wimp.

Anyway, here's something more upbeat and adowabul, though no less twisted. From the same guy that created The Binding of Isaac, jump to 1:04 and 2:40 to skip gameplay.



[Just ignore the voices, the player was Skype-ing his friend, apparently.]

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How not to lose a tail...

...by slowing down so much to the point of stopping as you turn your car 'round the corner, and then repeatedly whip your head back to the direction you just came from.

While still at that same corner. In everybody's way.

Women drivers.

P.S. I am very easily annoyed these days.

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Hey y'all! Short fourth-wall post...

I finally modified my blog template! :)

I was reluctant to do so at first because I generally do not want to touch any HTML code, as I'm totally unfamiliar with all that tech stuff.

But I figured, since I'm really, really good at building up walls o' text, and the narrow body does make it difficult to read, I might as well widen the whole thing just so my posts don't seem too formidable to take on.

[And no, I still refuse to give in to Pictures! Unless I'm doing my Melbourne trip posts and possibly the Italian ones. Don't hold your breath. For the posts, I mean, they won't be for a long while :P]

Anyway, I think I maaayyy have a little more time on my hands on weekends (that would not have been spent on sleeping in front of the telly), so I'm gonna start customizing my blog a bit more! Nothing radical like, full-on background template changes or anything, but one thing I'm really interested to explore further is Pages, which I feel can be really useful for my book and movie reviews.

And yes, I know the Pages option has been around for like, 10 years, but I'm very much a not-rock-the-boat kinda girl, soooo... um... hurray again for... minute changes? :P

Well, that's about it from me now. I'm currently working on the holiday posts, along with some book/movie reviews, like, simultaneously; hopefully I can get those up soon.

Till next time, toodles! :D

P.S. I just realised that the widening will affect the YouTube vids I'd posted. Argh.

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I so have no luck with KFC.

I even went to the same outlet that I went to last Friday evening.

Even brought along the ol' ball and chain. Which is to say, my backpack, laptop and technological stuff.

Anyway, this week I didn't have the misfortune of having a shirt-flapping, belt-buckling fatty in my line of sight. I also didn't really have to wait in line that long, which sounds like a promising start.

What I did have to wait for, was the chicken.

That's right, folks, the chicken joint ran out of chicken, and was out of it for 15 minutes. Oh, the brutal irony!

And if that wasn't enough, the guy mixed up my order and gave me a drumstick instead of a breast. The second time I sent it back (after 15 minutes waiting time), he exchanged my thigh for another thigh, and retained the drumstick.

Sweat.

The lady next to me was quite pissed also, because she was expecting her chicken to come sooner than expected. I don't blame her, since it is dinner time and you're not supposed to run out of chicken during rush hour. But then again, she misheard her server and thought her chicken would be ready in two minutes.

To her server's credit, I did hear him say 'twenty', as in 'minutes'.


['Yeah'.]

And the best part? She'd actually filled in a comment card and dropped it into the box before paying for her take-out.

[Then she spent the next 15 minutes glaring at the servers, at her watch and then at her Blackberry, not in that order.]

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Boys can be so disgusting.

Just because you held the door for me going into KFC, doesn't mean you're allowed to adjust the tightness of your belt in front of me. 

For five straight minutes. 

I mean... dude, quick and easy, please. Unbuckle, shift, shove in loophole, buckle, tuck. 

But no. He didn't miss out on the shifty-eyes-for-watchers, but he missed out on speed. And holding down the bottom of his shirt. Unfortunately for me, I didn't avert my eyes quick enough.

I glimpsed flesh. Of the mid-girth variety.

And he was repulsively fat. Not obese; obese fat is a different thing entirely. Obese fat can be cute. 

This guy was neither here nor there. He definitely wasn't thin, but he wasn't full-out fat, either.

He's the kind of fat that hangs around the stomach and man-boobs. The kind that flops with every minute movement. 

And move like Jagger, he did. He never stopped jigglingfidgeting. In my line of sight.

In other words... repulsive.

By the time the order was completed (they ordered five-six sets with drinks and added wedges), he'd finish half of the drink and snitched half of the wedges. And he did all that, shifting from right leg to left, bounding (drink in hand) to the table where the rest of his party was seated, back to where his mother was waiting for the rest of the food, and then burping in his mother's face.

Now that we've gotten the grossly-pubescent teenager out of the way, let's get started on his mom.

She kept repeating, "paha sama wing" to the KFC dude serving her. By the fourth consecutive time I heard this damn phrase, I was ready to grab her Gucci handbag and beat her to fucking death with it.

I mean, haven't you heard of the word, 'dan'?! It means, 'and', lady. You don't use 'sama'; 'sama' means 'same'. Essentially, she's been saying, "thigh = wing" over and over again to the KFC dude.

I was stuck behind these two asshats for 15 minutes. The fact that I hefted my laptop-laden backpack along didn't help.

The day I leave my backpack/bag/item of value in my car will be the day that my car gets stolen.

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Ebert... didn't... like The Avengers...

...I think...? :S

Check out his review here. He gives the movie three stars (out of four), but his review seems a tinge snarky than usual. He barely even seems to be on the fence.

Sigh. It really does seem that Ebert has written off allmost comic book movies.

[Still can't believe he enjoyed Green Lantern more than Thor.]

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Marvel's The Avengers (2012)

True believers, I bring glad tidings! :)

*spoilers*

I wasn't sure whether this movie would work, seeing that Robert Downey Jr's star is still cruising along the Ascension Drive, I was a bit afraid that The Avengers would revolve around him. Thankfully, the film keeps its eye on the word 'ensemble', and gives everyone their time to shine. Even Scarlett Johannson's Black Widow does her fair share as part of the team, and I'm really glad that she has purpose and is not just there to be eye candy, like in Iron Man 2.

[I always thought that making ScarJo a spy was just an excuse to get her in the movie. And into a black catsuit.]

This brings us to character development. Marvel Studios has a very good track record with this, as we can see from Iron Man, Thor, etc., and The Avengers takes the time to flesh out the possible conflicts between all these characters, from their own movies, meeting/working/coming together for the first time.

This is where the movie gets a bit draggy.

In setting up the foundation and formation of the Avengers, there's roughly an hour and a half's worth of in-fighting and quibbling, so much so that in the second half, you don't disagree when the big bad of the piece, Tom Hiddleston's Loki tells Downey, Jr.'s Tony Stark that they (the heroes) are too busy fighting each other to combat an invading alien army.

All these catfights (physical and verbal) were only alleviated by some action sequences in-between (either hero-on-hero, or hero-on-Loki), but barely. At one point, all the heroes were even put in a room to see how far and furious egos and mouths can fly. This entire bit was noticeably tedious the second time around (yes, I watched this movie twice!).

Other than inner conflict, the pacing is superb, and the movie starts with Loki arriving to Earth and causing a lot of property damage in his wake. Since we already know the cast from the previous movies (with the exception of newbie Mark Ruffalo, but then again, who doesn't know that he's playing Bruce Banner/the Hulk), little time was spared on introductions to the major characters.

Another highlight of the film is the screenplay. Iron Man has to be credited with some of the funniest dialogue and back-and-forths that even made us moviegoers forget that a comic book movie should have more action, and I'm glad this tradition (humour, not non-action) is carried onto The Avengers. There are just so many priceless quotable gems from this film that I could rave about, most of them from Robert Downey, Jr., because what would a movie be without good ol' RDJ sarcasm, eh?

I also noticed that Thor and Loki's speech pattern is a lot more... formal (still no 'verily's or 'thou's, but close) than they were in Thor, but maybe that's just me; I haven't seen Thor in a year.

[For some reason, HBO doesn't seem to want to air it :S]

One of the bright spots in the film is when they tone down the action (and the arguing!) and focus on regular one-on-one conversations/interactions between characters, may it be hero or villain. This is especially where the actors shine, and you can see how comfortable they all are in their roles, since most of them are playing the same character the second time around. Scenes to look out for are Stark/Banner, and Thor/Loki, when Thor first lands on Earth. I've a vested interest in Thor/Loki, but I think you can tell from my Thor review I'm biased somewhat.

[Hiddles!]

The second act is where the Avengers get their act (pun totally intended!) together, and where the action is kicked up a notch. The humour is also knocked out of the park from here on out, with a very, very, very unexpected character being a major source of that humour. Watch the movie and you'll know what I mean. We also get to see Chris Evan's Captain America organising the team and plan of attack, which is a fantastic nod to the comics since in canon, Cap'n is the leader of the Avengers.

CGI? Don't get me started. Huge explosions, huge set-pieces, it's all very grand and awesome. 'Nuff said.

This is one of the rare films that actually lives up to the hype generated, and unless you've... not been in touch with the world lately (is it me, or is 'living under a rock' cliched?), the hype is MASSIVE! Four years' worth of excitement building up to this moment, and it surprisingly delivers.

Three, fairly oft-used sentences, people: Best. Entertaining Movie. Ever.

[Yes, even with the in-fighting.]

By the way, don't watch the 3D version, it really isn't much to shout about.

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Ohmigosh, did you feel that?!

At around 4.40pm today, we felt tremors in our office, aftershock of what we know to be an earthquake that happened off the coast of Aceh.

For me, it was like a literal hit in the back, but that was all I felt. I guess the dwindling tremors didn't affect me much after that was because I was already having a three-hour old migraine at that point. Based on what my colleagues told me, the floor was still shaking as we high-tailed it outta there(!)left, which means the tremors should have lasted around 5-10 minutes.

We even took the elevator down. I know that the infinitely-right thing to do was to take the stairs, but we were on the 16th floor. And the elevator arrived just when we were about to head down the fire escape, sooo.... *shrug*

When the elevator reached 'Ground', we totally ran out of the building.

6.46pm - And here we go again. Second wave, blimey.

Update: Rumor is that tsunami will hit Penang at 9.11pm.

Edit made on 2 May 2012: No tsunami, folks. Also, watched The Avengers in theatres twice.

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I feel so detached...

...from the cinema.

There are like, a crapton of movies that I would like to see right now, except that I can't spare the time to go see them on account of me having to work at all hours. Including weekends.

Kid you not. It's a public holiday today, and I'm sitting in office, banging out billable items and emails.

[And this xD]

My only consolation is that I get to sleep in a bit (instead of having to reach office at 8.30am) and that I get to wear jeans. Oh, and the fact that today isn't a regular workday (despite full attendance) is that I'm allowed to feel like leaving when I want.

And today, I feel like leaving at 5-ish, on account of me being already here at 9-ish in the morning.

Oh, simple joys.

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"Avengers Assemble...

A HUMAN CENTIPEDE!!"

See awesome, awesome video below, thankyou :)

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Matchmaking.

So yesterday, my Mum's friend's sister tried to set me up with someone she knows, on account that I'm "too hardworking and don't have a social life".

In other words, I think she means I hang out with dem ol' geezers too often. Figures. In my defense, though, I only join them for dinner on Saturday nights, after church.

Anyway, Ms Odious went on and on and on about how good-looking her friend is, how he's a mutual fund agent and therefore, KNOWS ACCOUNTING, works weekends, and thus, will be PERFECT for me (*eyeroll*).

Notwithstanding the fact that being a mutual fund agent doesn't necessarily mean that one would have an accounting background (I mean, it's like being in insurance, for Pete's sake, it's all sales), Ms Obnoxious further said that the guy's 36 years old (36!), and also doesn't have a social life (on account of working weekends). She says she keeps telling him to get a girlfriend; I'm pretty sure he feels like telling her to STFU whenever she does.

I guess that's the only thing he and I have in common. Except that I don't feel like telling, I feel like punching.

The minute we got into the car, she starts texting this long message to aforementioned friend, telling him (probably) my name, (definitely onwards) my age, my job (thank goodness I had the presence of mind to NOT tell Ms Lack-of-Information-Security the name of my workplace when she asked), WHERE I FUCKING STAY (though not specifically), and also, if he's interested, she'll get my cellphone number from her sister.

I knew that Mum's Friend doesn't keep my number, but as I have always been fantastic bosom buddies with Timing (/sarcastic), I had just called her a few days ago because I couldn't reach my Mum and thought she might be with her Friend.

[And she fucking wasn't.]

You may be wondering at this point how I know all the details of Ms Intolerable's texting activities. Well, in the car, she was  shotgun, and I was in the backseat, driver's side. Since she's heading towards geriatric, she uses large text on her phone. REALLY large. I was able to see the entire thing without even leaning forward.

The reason why I'm so pissed about this is because SHE. DIDN'T. ASK. Apart from the fact that I already don't like the fuck out of her, there was absolutely no consent on my part to this. She just bulldozed her way into announcing that she'll be pairing me up with this unlucky guy ("unlucky" because Ms Unbearable knows he exists), who doesn't even know that he is constantly in her thoughts, and that his affairs are being meddled into as we speak.

What's worst is that my Mum certainly didn't say anything to discourage Ms Meddlesome either; she just seems mildly disinterested when Ms Horrible was doing her sales pitch. Myself, I honestly don't know how to deal with these... kinds of people, and since my temper was already boiling over and Mum has always asked me to be nicemaintain relations due to Mum's Friend's mother (who was also at dinner), I just stared intently at my cellphone videogame and played on.

When we got home, I beratedtold my Mum about what Ms Insufferable did, and asked her to quickly text her Friend for her to ask Ms Annoying POLITELY (Mum's words, not mine) that I'm not interested and please don't simply give out my number to strangers ktnxbai.

She did, and Mum's Friend replied that she'd actually wanted to "blast" (her words) Ms Iritating there and then at dinner for being so, well, her.

Thank heavens and lamb shanks Mum's Friend and her sister DO NOT get along. AT ALL.

This morning, Mum's Friend texted my Mum saying that she overlooked the 'POLITELY' in my Mum's text and just told her sister off. Mum's Friend texted again a bit later, and said that Ms Asshat wasn't going to give out my cellphone number (because they didn't have it yay), she was just going to ask the guy to look me up on Facebook if he was interested.

To that I say, "Good luck."

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27 April 2012.

I just found out something about this date. It's very significant, and, though I think I'll still be bogged down by work around that time, well, if you really care about something, you'll MAKE the time for it.

Here's why:

Okay, granted that the trailer said 4 May 2012, but I read in the papers today that The Avengers will open in Malaysia on 27 April 2012! That's like, 1 week before the US premiere!!!

It's like watching a leaked movie, except with far better quality and I need to pay money for it!

*explodes from excitedness*

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Immortals (2011)

Movies that I usually watch without any prior expectations tend to please me. This is one of them.

I wasn't able to glean much by the trailer, apart from swords-and-sandals (and sometimes bright yellow ones), and fighting, and slow-mo, and chroma-key. With the exception of the bright yellow, it looked like 300.


[I've even seen comments that said this is 300 with people that wear bras on their heads. Teehee.]

Despite loving 300, I know that marketing people are very devious nowadays, and I went in thinking that all of the awesome scenes in the movie is only the length of that movie trailer.

Thankfully, I'm mistaken.

The storyline for the movie is based on the legend/myth (can't tell the difference) of Theseus. Theseus was the demi-god that went into the labyrinth to battle the Minotaur, and found his way out using the ball of thread/twine he had used to mark his path on his way in. The cool part of the movie is that the story depicts the characters slightly differently than what we know them from (the Minotaur is actually a huge guy with a bull helmet, and not a man born with the head of a bull), showing us that myth is based on second-hand accounts (or at least, on exaggeration).

Violence? Check. Super-duper awesome fight scenes? Check. Slow-mo? Hell-to-the-yeah check! Visually it's like 300, with absolutely gorgeous and fantastic shots (don't think I can call CG renderings cinematography) of cliffs, dams, fortresses, you name it. If it's a building, it will be set across a vast landscape, so that you can see that how bloody grand ancient Greece is. It's slightly ridiculous, though, how quickly we move from one plot location to another, as these really huge terrains should take at least a few weeks to cross, and these people seem to reach them in a matter of hours. Anyway, at least it keeps the plot moving.

Speaking of story, it doesn't really have any. And some parts don't make sense: It's ridiculous how the Oracle will choose to sleep with Theseus, and by way, lose her powers of foretelling, at such a pivotal time when foretelling will most certainly come in handy. Actually, 'ridiculous' doesn't quite describe the situation; 'effing stupid' is more like it.

[Fun Fact: Henry Cavill will be playing Superman in Zack Snyder's Man of Steel, while Matt Bomer almost played Superman but lost out to Brandon Routh. Just as well, Superman Returns was atrocious.]

The main reason why this movie was because of the end-scene, showing Theseus doing battle with the Titans, along with the other Olympian Gods, viewed through the eyes of Theseus's son.

In the sky. With clouds and stuff. It looked like a magnificent Renaissance painting, except that it moved. And in slow-mo too, of course.

My first impression of this is that, despite Mount Tartarus collapsing on majority of the Titans, some had escaped, and since Theseus was elevated to God-status (to save him), the war is still ongoing, and Theseus, now an Olympian, is fighting the good fight against the Titans.

I finally read online that Theseus's son had actually inherited his mother's foresight, making this final scene your typical sequel set-up. This detracts from my enjoyment of the end a bit (I am very, very, very disappointed), but it's still a very, very glorious scene.

Immortals is miles, miles better than the atrocious Clash of the Titans remake, which incidentally has a sequel coming out this March, aptly titled Wrath of the Titans (underline is my own doing). From the trailer, looks the storyline will be exceedingly similar to Immortals, except that it has Liam Neeson and Ralph Fiennes, goodness knows why.

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The Adventures of Tin Tin: Secret of the Unicorn (2011)

I hadn't intended on seeing this movie, but since my office selected it for Movie Night, I figured I might as well go. 'Cuz it's free.

And I'm really glad I did.

Tin Tin starts of with our eponymous lead buying a model ship from a vendor. Almost immediately, his house is broken into, and, in the full spirit of "one thing leads to another", Tin Tin gains a comrade in Captain Haddock, and both set out to find the Unicorn, a sunken ship lost in history, said to contain great treasures. It's a treasure/scavenger hunt kinda movie, with exotic locations and mind-boggling riddles, as Tin Tin and Haddock rushes from one place to another to stop the villainous Lord Sakharin from further sulling the Haddock name and finding the lost shipwreck said to contain great treasure.

As you may already know/partially-guessed/realized, one of my favourite things in the world is wordplay (which is probably why I love Terry Pratchett so much), and wordplay is fairly abundant in this movie. I mean, "sour-faced man with the sweet name"? "Monsieur Suegar Adeitif"? GENIUS!

[For that last one, I was the one of the extremely few in the entire theatre who laughed. Think the others must've thought I laughed because of the Milanese Nightingale's accent.]

From the incompetent but unintentionally-twin bobbies (Thomson and Thompson) to the prolonged (but effective) scene in the desert where an unconscious Tin Tin almost slides into the still-spinning propeller, from Captain Haddock's extremely strong alcoholic breath to the final showdown between Haddock and Sakharin that mirrored that of their ancestors, Tin Tin fantastically proved me wrong. Despite my earlier (but unfounded) misgivings that Tin Tin was a children's movie, and my rushing through traffic to the theatre (and missing the first 5 minutes of the film), I had a rollicking good time at the movies that night. I couldn't help but be immersed in the adventure.

You'd think they'd overhyped it because it was a Spielberg-Jackson joint-venture; it's not. I would've given it a second go, if my first time wasn't that late into its theatre run. It really is that highly enjoyable.

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Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2 (2011)

Review to first part here!

[This has been so long overdue.]

HP7.2 continues where the first one left off, in the aftermath of Dobby's death, and our kids continuing along their way in finding and destroying all the Horcruxes. The movie comes to a head at Hogwarts, where Voldemort brings his followers to launch a massive climactic on the school, with a final fight between Harry and Voldemort. Bets off on who won :)

After the pretty good first installment (again, I begrudgingly admit that one movie wouldn't have been enough), what I'd really wanted to see was the second half of the movie, which is where all the good (CG) stuff happens. I was actually afraid that they would leave out the spiders and giants, but thank goodness they didn't. The final fight between Harry and Voldy was slightly meh (the 'struggling and flying in mid-air for a while' wasn't too bad, though) since they only pointed their wands at each other. There was no "Expelliarmus" exclamation from Harry when Voldy went, "Avada Kedavra", like in the book. I mean, that's the whole point of the entire story, Harry defeating Voldy by only using a Disarming charm, instead of more potent curses. Quite disappointing.

But what I'm most looking forward to is The Prince's Tale.

For non-Potterphiles, The Prince's Tale is a Book 7 chapter that reveals all of Severus Snape's intentions, motivations, etc. throughout the entire series, and it happens upon his death. Snape has been the most enigmatic of the bunch, being a Death Eater-turned-turncoat currently double-agenting in Camp Voldy, sparking a "is he, isn't he?" debate among the books' characters.


[The debate even spills over to real life, I believe, in Potter site forums around the world.]

This chapter finally confirms his true loyalties. And this entire sequence could not have been made or filmed better, nor could it have been any more effective. My heart broke watching it. Beautifully done. If I did not already love Alan Rickman, this will certainly do.

Apart from the above, Neville-Luna pairing? Egad, sounds like a fanfic! I didn't even realise that from the books; neither did a friend of mine evidently, she told me she was shocked beyond belief. I always thought at most, Neville and Luna are just friends as they barely have any dialogue with each other in the books, which brings me to the need that Hollywood has in pairing people up at conclusions. Also, it was unfortunate that the movie left out the part in the end where Harry repairs his old wand using the Elder Wand before he relinquishes the physical Elder wand. It could've taken all of five seconds, and they didn't even bother including that scene in. What the eff.

As a close, watching the final scene where grown-up Harry and his friends send off their children for Hogwarts is, well, bittersweet. It's sad, but yet it's a happy ending, and it feels like things have come full circle, back to the first movie where Harry first gets on the Hogwarts express.

"It all ends", true, but it's great close to an era, and it feels like a new beginning.


[Sob. No more Potter movie this year.]

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Enter...

 THE DRAGON!

*sweat*

NOT HIM LA AIYOOO!

[That's better :)]

GONG XI FA CAI!!

May this year of the Dragon bring you great wealth, fantastic health, and an abundance of prosperity!

Happy Holidays!

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Captain America: The First Avenger (2011)

After two superhero origin movies in a row that summer, we finally get one where he doesn't start off a cocky, arrogant dickhead.

[Late, late, I know.]

*fairly spoilerish*

One of the things that Marvel does so well is character development, and it firmly establishes Chris Evan's during the first half hour of the film. Every scene with pre-serum Chris Evans portrays him as the underdog with spirit so much bigger than his body (now I sound like I'm reviewing an animal movie), that you just can't help but root for (literally) the little guy. Considering that we're much more used to seeing Evans as the cocky, arrogant comic relief in the Fantastic Four movies (or in anything else, for that matter), surprisingly we are not reminded of his past sarcastic witticisms and the general comic adorableness that we've become so accustomed to.

[I mean, he's still pretty adorable in the movie, but it's not the usual kind, if you know what I mean.]

Even though the CG to shrink Evans is a bit weird (since I'm so much used to seeing him in his usual size), it doesn't pose much of a distraction from the dialogue or anything else, since Evans does a bang-up job as the little guy that wants do so much but is hindered by physical means. The scene where he finally gets the super-soldier serum is really quite satisfying, except for the part immediately after, where his benefactor (Stanley Tucci in a rare German-but-non-villain role) is immediately killed by German spies.

Supporting cast can do no wrong: Tommy Lee Jones is awesome as always, while Hugo Weaving turns in another villainous role with a European accent, but eh, when I first saw the casting I thought he'd be perfect as Red Skull, though I think he would be slightly more awesome as Sinestro. It's a pity they didn't bring back John Slattery to play Howard Stark; that would've been a very neat way to link this movie to Iron Man 2.

On an emotional level, the movie succeeds very well as evident by Cap'n's losses throughout the movie. First he loses his best friend Bucky Barnes (in the comics he actually takes over the Cap'n mantle for a while) during a mission, and then at the end, we see him part from his girlfriend Peggy Carter, as he is forced to crash the German craft into the ocean to avoid its trajectory towards the US. We know that Cap'n'll survive that crash (on account of the Avengers), but we also know that he'll never see her again. Watching that scene where Peggy speaks to Cap'n over the radio and finally gets cut off is just heartbreaking.

Overall, the storyline is pretty simple and straightforward (America vs. the Nazis) compared to other origin movies (evil half-brother always works for me), but as I said, Captain America has a ton of heart. It's not all happy-endings, but you still leave the theatre with a warm, fuzzy feeling inside that has nothing to do with The Avengers teaser after the end-credits.

[Oh, and Red Skull dies. OR DOES HE?! He looks like he gets obliterated when he's holding the Cosmic Cube with his bare hands, but those of us who paid attention during Thor knows that it looks like a Bifrost Bridge, which is how Asgardians travel from one plane to another. Yeah! Maybe that's how Loki knows how to teleport to Earth without fanfare ^v^]


Ahem. Sorry. Couldn't resist that last bit.

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