Oh Hey, I Remember You

I totally forgot about watching K-ON!
Breaking Bad Season 5 hasn't finished yet, so I won't watch that. Game of Thrones has ended for a while so that's out. Guess I should start up on that anime again, eh?

Or should I watch LOST? Decisions...

The Inside of the Transportation Rings

I just spent the last hour looking through Stargate episodes to find a specific scene. There was one moment in the entire series in which we got to see what the inside of the transportation rings look like during their operation. It was amazing and I still remembered it and I just had to see it again just now.

So, after a little searching, I found it. 'Season 5, Episode 1: Enemies', @14:44. Still sweet. Totally worth it.

Statute of Limitations

How long after a work comes out should people wait before speaking freely about it in the open? As a lover of stories I have great respect for narrative and a proper hatred of spoilers. As such, when dissecting the latest yarn I do my best to ward spoiler-averse people away.

But there has to be a certain point in time when there should no longer be an expectation of warning at all, when everyone who planned to watch/read it has had ample opportunity. When do you guys think that time should be?
For example, it's ridiculous to say "Spoilers Ahead": Jesus dies. Rosebud was his sled. Bruce Willis was dead the whole time. Etc.

I usually give a book series 2-3 months after completion. A TV series with several seasons gets longer, at least long enough for a person to marathon it at a decent pace.

Mass Effect 3: Thoughts

Finished the game. Not going to spoil, it's worth playing and I don't want to ruin it for you guys.

But I will give out some of my thoughts.

I liked it. The ending is a little weak but I didn't feel like I wasted my time at all and I'm going to play it again.

Yep. That's that.
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You may have heard that Bioware's fanbase has been drinking a lot of the haterade for years. There's a large and rabid band of people who have been heaping the scorn and internet rage on all kinds of things Bioware for a long time, and not just on Mass Effect 3 but other games developed by the company, and even singling out specific writers for the company. It's gotten out of hand.

More Dreams

I had another interesting dream last night, maintaining my streak of strange lucid sessions. I think it's because I've shifted my bed to a new spot in my room, closer to the window. Perhaps a slight temperature difference radiating through the curtain influences my mind in the wee hours of the morning when I'm deep in the appropriate REM cycle.

I encountered Darkseid but he wasn't allowed to fight me because he hadn't filled out the appropriate paperwork. Saved by the bureaucracy. Who would have thought.



Did I mention I liked JL/U?

Batman

Comic book Batman's gotten pretty pre-reboot James Bond-sy. That is to say, he's become a parody of himself. You heard about how Batman is crazy prepared, as in he's prepared for anything that could happen ever and that's why he can go toe-to-toe with anyone who ever existed? Yeah, that's what I'm talking about. Writers for Batman stories have gotten their heads so twisted, they can't portray him as a believable character anymore. He's no longer "Bruce Wayne by day, masked crime fighter at night". He's "The Goddamned Batman". Nigh invulnerable. Goes on adventures with the Justice League. Goes on adventures outside of Gotham, sometimes not even on Earth. Going missing for extended periods like that has to be noticeable.

Simply put, Batman is broken. Just like Artemis Entreri, just like Ando, he's lost what made him special. He used to be the human element among scientifically-augmented humans, extraterrestrial aliens, robots, superhumans and other such implausible good guys. It's gotten to this point partly because of the fandom, partly because of poor writing. Writers see how much the fans love a character and they say, Hey! They love him like that! Then lemme make him MOAR AWSUM! And that's why you get stuff like Batman punching Superman and somehow doing anything more than getting a throbbing hand.



Batman should never have been placed in the same universe as Superman.
I love the animated series Justice League/ Unlimited and I can understand the corporate decision to put their two biggest properties together. But these two are in different classes and worlds universes in fact, when it comes to their separate realities. I'm talking villains.
Batman's villains are jokes compared to what a Superman villain has to be to make things interesting for Superman. This is really where the writers have to get ham-fisted in order to make things work. It's not pretty. Joker is a deranged but brilliant criminal but he has nothing on Superman. But when he's armed with the greatest power of all: THE WRITERS, he can do anything. He can knock Superman out with a electric buzzer (he has one of those), he can hit him with a projectile weapon infused with Kryptonite (an amazingly poor plot device in its own right), etc. All this despite Superman's super-fast reaction times in other situations.

My suspension of disbelief can only stretch so far.

Breaking Bad: Jesse Pinkman/ Aaron Paul

So, after a long hiatus due to Skyler's bitchiness, I resumed watching Breaking Bad and finished up to Season 4. Now I have to wait until Season 5, the final season, comes out.

Meanwhile, while Skyler and Marie took turns one-upping each other in the stupidity department. Skyler does a few ok things, like helping to launder the money Walter brings in, but she manages to screw that up, too. Marie, on the other hand, is a totally worthless character as far as intelligence is concerned. I wish she got worse than what she did.

Speaking of stupid: Jessie Pinkman. He is dumb, just so dumb. I hate him so much for that. He's surrounded by people who know what they are doing or know what to do or know how to do something well. That's Mike, Gustavo, and Walter, respectively. Jessie doesn't fit in to any of those categories. He cooks meth the way a trained monkey with a good teacher would.
BUT
At his core, I'd have to say that Jesse is the only really good person on this show. He is the moral compass in the cast of characters. In a word, he really doesn't belong. He's too soft to lead this life of crime, but too stupid to do anything else.

Aaron Paul, the actor, does an amazing job. Season 3, Episode 9. There is a scene in which Jessie talks about a box he made in craft shop, a beautiful work of art that he ends up selling for drugs. It's a well-played scene that made me respect him more. Aaron Paul, not Jessie.

More Smooth Talkin'

It's true! What does this mean, though? What does this MEAN?!?!

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In other news, I was re-watching Ep.51 of Seinfeld, 'The Contest', and I realized once again how great that show is. So many catch phrases come from this one sitcom, so many 'sitcom plots' invented right here. It's mind-bottling. How I Met Your Mother has grown into its own, sure, but I can't say with any certainty that this show will become a classic by any means other than the character Barney Stintson.

All Hope Is Not Lost, Penny Pigtails #2

As I said in the previous post, I've done quite a bit of activist stuff here in the past week. It had to be done but I don't want to inundate my blog with that stuff. We shouldn't always be On, you know?

So anywayz, continuing from part 1.

We live in some interesting times, people. No, no, I'm not even referring to so-called "important" stuff like politics and shit. I'm talking about the polarity between Awesome and Suck that defines American society today. I will elaborate.

TV Shows and My Attention Span

Posting for 12/6.

You remember K-ON!, Breaking Bad, Dexter, Game of Thrones and Sasuke? Yeah, I haven't done any watching of those shows of my own volition in a long while.

I hesitate to say I've gotten bored of them, that isn't quite the feeling. I suppose I am just not in the mood to watch them at the moment. Why don't I just watch it anyway?

Well, now. Here's my thought process on that. If I watched it now, when I don't really feel like it, I wouldn't get as much enjoyment out of the experience as I would have otherwise. A friend once told me that was such a deep way of looking at it. I can understand that feeling. It's still good, right? You'll still laugh when it's funny, etc., right? Well, yeah, but I wouldn't laugh as hard, you know?

And so they sit on the back burner, as they say. ╮(╯ヮ╰)╭ Until such time as they would bring me maximum returns on entertainment and enjoyment.

Within the family my sibs and I refer to this as the product in question having "gone out of phase". Picture a sinusoidal curve (or a co-sinusoidal curve, if you like). The amount of enjoyment rises to a peak, where we feel like playing the video game or watching a show all the time, then it peters out and we put it away in a corner for a while.

Finally Watching That One Movie

So you all should have gotten the impression by now that I love to heap scorn on remakes and crappy new stuff. Well, I do make an effort to watch/read that crappy new stuff so I know what I'm talking about when I rant about 'em. I can't appreciate when people talk bad about Twilight but have never actually read a page or crack jokes (unless they're clever, in which case they may get a pass) about Dragonball: Evolution without watching it. Yeah, I can't demand that everyone spend their time doing that stuff but in a way I feel like it's akin to joking about or hating on, for example, Muslims but never actually having met or even seen one. Or even bothering to do any research about their differences.

And osmosis through popular media doesn't count, naturally. (- -_)

Any ways, back on topic: the other day I finally got to watch Full Metal Jacket [1987] in its entirety. Yeah, it's been on my list for a long time. Over a decade, in fact. But after years of small YouTube clips of famous scenes from the movie I found it on TV and got to see the whole thing. Scratch one haha.

Military Channel

Costanza would approve.

So I've been watching a lot of Military Channel this past week. Really interesting, entertaining AND educational stuff. THE TRIFECTA.

Watching Surviving the Cut has the same effect as watching Sasuke, haha: It's making me want to work out and get fit. Now that makes this quality TV in my book.

There was a feature called Hitler's Deadliest Secret: The Hunt for U-864 on last night. Hitler sent a submarine with blueprints and materials for building jet fighters to Japan in 1944. Fortunately, for the Allies, it never made it. The British submarine, HMS Venturer, sank it in the North Sea. What makes this engagement unique is that this remains the only instance in history that a submarine has sunken another submarine in combat whilst both were submerged. I don't know about you but I was surprised to learn this fact. Haha, I mean torpedo vs torpedo salvos, I've seen that in the movies more than once, I'm sure. Once again I am reminded that TV is not reality. (^︿^;;)7

One of the Venturer's crewmen on that day, now a white-haired old man, told us about the event and the aftermath. In particular, I noted his description of the crew's reaction after hearing the hit. At first everyone cheered and celebrated. Then the elation of having eliminated the threat rapidly vanished as the reality settled on their minds. That was another U-boat full of men they just sent to the bottom. Men like them, just doing their duties. Everyone sobered up. There really wasn't cause for celebration.

Military Movie Mood and some Random Info

I've been in the mood for some military films this past week. Action packed, sure. Realistic, not usually. Entertaining, yes.

The discipline and control of a well-trained military unit is undeniably cool. War, actual war is not.  Nevertheless, a few generations of people have grown up seeing war on the big screen, not with their own eyes. They play games like Call of Duty.
This isn't a post about desensitization or "video games encourage violent behaviour" bullshit, though.

No, my point is that war seems cool to a lot of people. On a related note, guns are cool to a lot of people despite their function. Back in the day, I didn't understand. I feel safe in assuming that only a fraction of them have ever actually shot a person or been shot. When I heard someone say that a certain gun 'sucked' I could only imagine that they were speaking from a list of numbers: statistics of range, caliber of bullet, and maybe even something they'd read concerning its reliability in the field but mostly not from personal experience. If they had a bullet in them I wondered if they'd note any difference about the gun it came from. Oh, it's possible they'd be able to remark on it, sure.
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Time for an educational moment.

Do you know what it means to "go into shock"? I'll wager you think it's what you've seen on TV or in the movies. A person, possibly injured and/or in a crisis situation, is pale, shaking, stuttering, eyes wide, deer-in-the-headlights look on they face, right? Naw. That's called *being* shocked, not *in* shock. Shock is a medical term for when not enough blood is getting to where it needs to go, usually from massive blood loss or some kind of trauma. It is not a psychological condition. When you go into shock, you're in need of some immediate medical attention.
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I'll give you these words of wisdom. I wish more people would take heed of them but it ain't meant to be so... But here they are:

TV shows and movies are forms of entertainment.

Yeah, shocking, I know. (hehe) You can learn a lot, but you have to know that it isn't there to educate first. Unless, you're watching a documentary..... No, you don't just have to know, you have to be aware. There is a difference.

Breaking Bad: Season 2 Episode 10

Watching Season 2 Episode 10 of Breaking Bad. Walt pays for a new water heater with his fat stacks and realizes one of them has Spooge's blood on it. But wait.

BLOOD DRIES BROWN.

I expected a little more know-how from this show. Blood contains oxygen and iron. After the blood has dried and the cells have died the iron reacts with air and rusts, creating the brown colour. Come on, Mr. White!

Or maybe I am asking for too much. I guess this is more Dexter's material. lol

The bad-ass clip that I posted, when Walt confronts those guys frontin' on his turf, comes at the end of this episode. In the context of the plot-line the scene takes on SO much more significance. Walt has come to realize that he LIKES being a bad-ass. His career in the drug underworld isn't over yet.... no sir.

Breaking Bad: Family Problems

Eight episodes into the second season now, Walt's second life has started to cause problems with his family. This should surprise no one. Walt isn't a very good liar when it comes to his wife. At this point he is still only an amateur criminal. He has his moments of bad-assery now and then but he has a ways to go before he reaches the point featured in that hardware store clip.

Because Walt is such a bad liar (where his wife is concerned anyway), those scenes do not entertain me. Futhermore, Skyler strikes me as an unintelligent character, which doesn't help things. I feel like Walt should be able to pull the wool over her eyes much better than he has been. Some of the cover lies he tells make me cringe. I think of the lie I would have told in his situation as the conversation rolls on. Then he goes in a different direction, one that can unravel with a single phone call between two people he assumes won't call each other. I wait for the times when his 'opponents' are thugs and bad guys so he can turn into Heisenberg.

Breaking Bad: Season 1

Just finished the first season, 7 episodes long. Each episode is ~48 minutes long and there's a good amount of plot development in every single one.

I know pretty much every commentary made by anyone on this series has made note of this but Bryan Cranston makes this show what it is. Having watched him on Malcolm in the Middle, this role really shows off his acting abilities. As Hal, he was such a bumbling fool. Walter White: polar opposite. The guy becomes such a bad-ass.

At the outset of the show he's a pretty soft, almost wimpy, guy. A brilliant chemist who turned down professorships in universities and high-level positions in the private sector, Walt lives his life as an under-appreciated high school chemistry teacher.

This benign lifestyle changes when his doctor diagnoses him with terminal lung cancer. He has a son with special needs and an expectant wife. Furthermore, their insurance doesn't cover treatment.

Walt ends up deciding to 'break bad' and use his chemistry skills to cook high quality crystal meth in order to leave enough money for his family to go on comfortably after his death. At heart Walt is a family man, and the excellence of this show's premise stems from the transformation his dark path has on him as he falls further and further into the drug trade underworld.

Breaking Bad posts?

Would it be interesting to post commentary on Breaking Bad episodes? It's some really good stuff so I won't have much to rant on.....

Short post for today. I don't have much time to write something more thought out. (^__^;;;)7
Have another bad-ass scene.

Breaking Bad Season 4

Season 4 has started up for this series and, as with Dexter, I have fallen a few seasons behind. I ended up marathoning through the last 4 seasons of Dexter and I'm going to do that with 2 and 3 here. Walter White is such a badass.