Late Night Television going down the tubes...

Thought of the Day:

Personally I have never watched to much late night talk shows besides Conan O'brien. But now I heard that Jimmy Fallon will replace Cona O'brien as host of NBC's Late Night in 2009. I'm not saying I'm not a fan of SNL, believe me I am, butI really didn't like the fact that most media outlets pointed to Fallon to be the saving of SNL a few years back. The man couldn't hold back from laughing almost every skit he was in! After Will Ferrell left in 2002 I believe that was the beginning of the rapid end of the long series. Once a juggernaut producing the next big comedy star for the movie industry (Eddie Murphy, John Belushi, Dan Aykroyd, Adam Sandler etc etc) has now fizzled out. In its place is now the alumni from the Daily Show taking charge of the market in a to totally different fashion. If anything they should get a shot of primetime television. This is exactly why I stopped watching basic network television...

Sidenote: One the head writers for the Daily Show first got his start for writing for Space Ghost Coast to Coast.

"Why So Serious?"

I'm Just Sayin'
The Essential Movie Review Before You Go Out and Spend Your Hard Earned Pennies.
On Tap: The Dark Knight

I can't really think of a witty way to open this review. Perhaps because it's close to 4 a.m. when getting out of the movie theater, or most likely because it was just a great film. The movie had an all-stars cast from Christian Bale to the late Heath Ledger. They director took a thoughtful look of the best story arcs of Batman done in the last 30 decades and created the best comic book adaptation movie yet.

Synopsis: The movie unfolds about a year later after the first movie, Batman Begins, takes place. The movie shows how he struggles to bring villains to justice while still trying to have someone to come home to. The mask crusader eventually meets up with his arc nemesis, The Joker, and mayhem ensues (literally) as they have a battle of the wits, placing everyone in a high stakes chess game throughout the entire movie. Batman tries to figure out how the Joker ticks and his motivations. One line the Joker spat during the film was, "You complete me."

In-depth: This Batman film succeeds where all the other movies in the franchise failed. The movie gets a chance to focus on several "super villains" throughout, but not in the campy 1960s Batman show that was re envisioned in Batman Forever and Batman and Robin pictures. Christopher Nolan (with his brother Johnathon Nolan penning the screenplay) showed other villains, but without developing a story to how they hate the Batman, and how they should work together to kill him. The villains were presented in a natural way how they fell into fighting Batman. The bad guys were great, and enough can't be said about the performance Heath Ledger gave to portray the Joker. I thought he was going to be good, but he was fantastic. He really made the character seem crazy even down to his body movements. The twitching and the little adjustments really drive home the point that the Joker has no real plan, he just enjoys killing.

The movie's theme was also powerful. What would people do if they were pushed to the limit? Would anyone keep it together? Or would they just act out like a pack of untrained dogs? It was perfectly illustrated as the Joker tries to show everyone how difficult life was for him every opportunity he got and how if they were in the same position they would do the same exact thing. Strongly based on Alan Moore's The Killing Joke and The Long Halloween by Jeph Loeb they blended the world perfectly for the tone of the Dark Knight. This is a intense story and placed in a dark environment. Just read the title: The Dark Knight. It made Iron Man look like the Care Bears Motion Picture.

Underneath it all: Just go see it. But it's not a kids film.

Score: 7/7 BoomShakalakas
"This town needs an emima!"

Sidenote: The only thing I wish I had in my movie was the trailers. I was pissed when I didn't see Watchmen or Terminator Salvation in my theater... I had to go all the way to youtube to find them!

-Jiraiya Goketsu Monogatari

Suit Up, Again.

Thought of the Day
I was watching an anime show the other day that was meant for 7-11 year olds. It touched on the subject of the fabric of time, the meaning of dreams and what true love meant. I then turned to Nickelodeon where I was plagued by a show call, Sponge Bob Square Pants. Then it became painfully obvious that this why all the good technology and advancement is coming from Japan. Over there, they are filling their minds with these awesome story lines and shows encouraging imagination and in-ward thinking, while we in America are watching shows about Sponges living in pineapples under the sea!!! Although I have to admit the one episode I watched was about Sponge Bob dealing with the issue of cannibalism. The picture apove is what I found of kids in Japan inventing things in there spare time. (If you don't know, that is a full scale Gundam in someone's backyard)

Sidenote: Learned a new word the other day. Paroxysmal N- any sudden, violent outburst; a fit of violent action or emotion: paroxysmal of rage.

Michael Bay is the King of B-rated Movies

Don't get me wrong I love Michael Bay. He has brought us movies such as The Rock, Bad Boys and Transformers. But after reading his script for his version of the highly anticipated movie, The Dark Knight, I believe he has lost his sanity. Here's an excerpt from the script. Maybe I should have seen this coming since he did direct The Island...







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BRUCE WAYNE is standing in front of a mirror, flexing his sculpted, shirtless torso.

BRUCE
Let's do this.

Cue AC/DC's "Back in Black." A series of quick shots show BRUCE gearing up: putting on the boots, slapping on the gloves, a brief across those beautiful pecs. Finally, there is no longer BRUCE WAYNE, but BATMAN standing before us.

BATMAN
Back in black.

Pyrotechnics erupt in the distance. Guitar solo.


I'm not making this up!!!! Check out the whole article at spill.com

"I've set my laser from stun to kill."

I'm Just Sayin'
The Essential Movie Review Before You Go Out and Spend Your Hard Earned Pennies.
On Tap: Wall-E

I have never been a fan of "children" films. It reaffirmed my claim when I saw the trailer Beverly Hills Chihuahua in front of Wall-E. My heart sunk to think this is what Disney has become, a shell of its former self since the mid 90s. But to my surprise Pixar (which is now keeping Disney in business) has another hit on their hands for the kids. With the beautifully intertwined mechanical love story, and the complexed social and economical issues as the backdrop, it made for an excellent film.

Synopsis: A love story about a little robot named Wall-E that was left on Earth to clean up all the trash. After a probe (EVE) comes to Earth for a mission, Wall-E falls in love with her and is determined to follow her to the ends of the Earth (or in this case, to the edge of the galaxy).

In-depth: For the first 23 minutes of the film the characters did not utter one real word. And yet it didn't matter. The nature of Wall-E being lonely and needing company screamed so loudly words were not needed. The element that everyone needs somebody was presented throughout the entire movie without verbalizing it once.

Also the element that was brilliant in the film was the issues of social and economical dilemmas, such as obesity, and wastefulness. In one point of the movie it mentioned how people of the spaceship no longer needed to walk but propelled by hover-chairs. As a result the entire human race became over weight and lazy guided by helper robots. Slowly this world has become more and more like that. Gone is the phrase, "a hard day of work", and replaced with "a day that I go through by when I'm suppose eat my next processed meal." People roll out of bed, into their cars, to cram into a cubicle all day before they woddle to the couch to unwind for hours watching needless TV. Further, because the people became so lazy, in the movie, the captain of the spaceship has trouble reading a book (which it seems be an epidemic for kids in this country). On the Earth sequences ruins of the city showed advertisements of how much society promotes super-sizes and bulk items. Earth was riddled with trash and no where to put it any longer. It showed the need of people to be more conscious of the environment. Al Gore probably started crying during the credits.

Underneath it all you need to know: That is the best children's film this year and is well worth your money. Once again Pixar is raising their own standards of well crafted films.

Score: 6.3 BoomShakalakas/7
"Movies can and do have tremendous influence in shaping young lives in the realm of entertainment towards the ideals and objectives of normal adulthood. "-Walt Disney

Sidenote: From several sources it has been revealed that from 1995's Toy Story, til Wall-E all the films from Pixar were discussed at a lunch!!! At one lunch! Outlining the raising success of, at the time, a relatively new company. I fear what suburb ideas Andrew Stanton and fellow writers at Pixar would think of if they all went on vacation together for a weekend...

- Jiraiya Goketsu Monogatan